When there is light, there will be darkness
by Goldenfightergirl
Summary: She didn't know what she was getting into when she first signed up to be Reed's assistant. All Nicole cared about was that she was going into space! On a spaceship! My spin on the Fantastic Five idea.
1. Prologue

**New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **Prelude**

"And this is the lab area. I expect you to be able to keep up with my research materials and assist me on my projects." With a smile, the tall man looked back at the young woman following him and his stockier friend, Ben Grimm.

"I understand Mr. Richards. In exchange for room and board, you need me to be your assistant." Here she paused, "Are you sure I'm qualified for this though? I mean I'm happy that you picked me, but it's just that I never even took a physics class before." The black haired female told them sheepishly.

"Ah don't cha' worry. Egg head here just needs someone to help him when I'm not here. There's plenty of room anyway. You might even learn a thing or two being here. Now if you excuse me, I got a lovely lady waiting for me at home." Ben gleefully told Reed.

He clapped Reed on the shoulder and shook the woman's hand before leaving.

"As Ben said, it's not a hard job. A bit of record management and helping me conduct my experiments. As long as you follow my instructions, you should be good. I hope you're up to it Nicole." Reed held his hand out to Nicole who only paused a second before smiling and taking his hand.


	2. The meeting

**Disclaimer: The usual of not owning a big franchise and not being rich.**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **ALMOST TWO YEARS LATER**

Standing in front of Von Doom Industries stood three people watching, as constructions workers welded a statue.

"Typical of Victor Von Doom to build a 30ft statue of himself," Ben grumbled to his companions.

"Well, it's obviously aimed at first-time visitors to create feelings of smallness… inadequacy." Reed replied back.

"Or disgust. You would think he could afford a better-looking statue. The artwork sucks by the way. It looks like patchwork art to me and where the hell is the safety! I see no cones or boundary lines, and they're welding on the stupid statue where anyone could walk by."

Nicole glared at the construction crew as she said this. "Good thing it ain't working." Ben chuckled at the indignation from the small woman. Reed just gave his friends a strained smile as he walks towards the entrance.

"Reed, what are we doing here? This guy's fast-food strip-mall science." Ben said after he and Nicole caught up to time.

"This wasn't our first stop, in case you forgot. Besides, Victor's not that bad. He's just a little… larger than life." Reed replied.

"I think you mean overcompensating Reed." Nicole sassed back as she gave Ben a high five while Reed rolled his eyes at them.

"My research suggests that exposure to a high-energy cosmic storm, borne on solar winds might have triggered the evolution of early planetary life." An awe-inspiring hologram zoomed in on an image as Reed gave his speech to his audience.

Of to the side stood Ben and Nicole watching the presentation. "I love my job. Reed makes such pretty holograms." She whispered to Ben who smiled and nudged her to be quiet.

"In 6 weeks another cloud with the same elemental profile will pass Earth's orbit. A study conducted in space could fundamentally advance our knowledge about the structure of the human genome, cure countless diseases, extend human life, give kids a chance to live longer, stronger, healthier-" Reed passionately spoke as his hands emphasize his point before he was cut off.

"Turn it off. Please." Victor Doom stated in the dark half of the conference room.

Reed looked a little put out about his speech being interrupted. "I don't think I've explained my proposal fully."

"No, I think you have. Same old Reed, always stretching, reaching for the stars with the weight of the world on his back. But dreams don't pay the bills do they?" Victor threw a magazine on the table.

'REED RICHARDS BANKRUPT' was the cover of a Wired magazine. Nicole brows furrowed while Ben had a scowl on his face.

"You remember, when we were in school, we talked about working together. Well, that's what I was about to explain." Reed pointed his PDA looking device at the holograms as it changed before everyone's eyes. An image of a space station appeared.

"The storm is deadly, but the shields on your station's control room are designed to protect any occupants inside." There was a muted click as the lights in the room turned on.

"So, it's not just my money you want. It's my toys. Tell me, if NASA doesn't trust you, then why should I?" All three guest exchanged surprised glances with each other as Victor smirked.

"That's my job – to stay a step ahead to know what other men don't." He stood up from his previously little dark corner and walked to the table that was before them, but not close enough to hear Ben and Reed's furious whispers.

Nicole was the only one of the three guests to notice that someone was walking into the room. She opened her mouth to say something but pouted as Ben interrupted her.

"I don't like this."

"Ben, this is business. Just work." Reed told his friend to calm him down.

"He's right, Ben – It is just business." The strawberry blond stated. From the corner of her eye, Nicole watched as Ben's head turn around as Reed's smile immediately wiped off his face.

Victor smiled as he looked at the blond, "I think you both know my director of Genetic Research. Ms. Xayadeth, this is Susan Storm." he gestured his hand introducing both women to each other.

Nicole glanced at Victor Doom before looking back at Susan as she walked over. "One more thing he's got." Muttered Ben to Reed. Nicole could practically feel the question marks floating around her head as the taller woman stopped in front of them.

"Hey, Susie," Ben told her.

"Hey, oh, it's so nice to see you, how's Debbie?" Asked Susan as she gave Ben a big hug.

Nicole glanced up at Reed as a flash of pain entered his eyes before it disappeared, replaced with a blank look. He looked away when he noticed Nicole looking at him.

"Great"

"Great." Both were smiling at each other, Susan released Ben and turned to Reed and Nicole.

A polite smile made it to her face as she shook Nicole's had for a second before looking directly at Reed.

"Uh, how have you been?" Reed asked her nervously.

"Never better." She shook his hand, and her polite smiled turn distant and cold. Nicole's neck hairs stood on end. She knew there was a big story here, as she could practically feel the woman's scorned coming in hot from Susan.

 _And this is where I scram._ Nicole took the time to make an excuse for herself about being useful and cleaning up the presentation for Reed. She really didn't want to be in the middle of that disaster. From what little she could glean from Ben's comment, she obviously put together that Susan and Reed were together at one point.

"This isn't gonna be a problem, is it?" Victor asked amusedly from where he was at.

"Oh, not at all." "No, I-" Reed and Susan started.

"Good." Victor smiled at them as he walked over to stand next to everyone.

"You're just in time to hear the great Reed Richards ask me for help." Here, unnoticed by anybody, Nicole rolled her eyes imagining herself taking a pot shot with a paintball gun to Victor's head for making Reed feel bad.

"You made a lot of folks at M.I.T. feel like a junior high science fair, so you'll excuse me if I savor the moment." A smug grin and a laugh escaped Vic don douche head.

Reed took a deep breath before speaking. "You back this mission and I'll sign over a fair percentage of any applications –"

"The number is 75, and its applications and patents." An incredulous look appeared on all three of the visitor's faces.

"What about his firstborn?" Ben sarcastically said.

"Ben." Red admonished while giving a stern look at Nicole who wanted to say something as well.

Laughingly Victor said, "Come on. Twenty-five percent of a billion is enough to keep the lights on a while, isn't it? Maybe even pay off your fourth mortgage on the Baxter building. Deal?" He reached out a hand which Reed looked at and glanced at Sue who motioned him to take it

With a heavy feeling, Ben and Nicole watched as Reed made a deal with the devil.

"Well then, to our future. Together." He stepped back and hugged Susan and smiled a slimy grin at the other three.

"It's funny how things turn out, isn't it?" He said mockingly.

"Hilarious." Reed drily replied back at him.


	3. Disappointments

**Disclaimer: Usual talking about not owning anything to make me rich**

 _ **Italics**_ **= thoughts**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **Please excuse any grammar mistakes that I may have missed in the chapter.**

 **Chapter 2**

After coming up with the terms of the agreement and signing the contracts, Nicole handed Reed his briefcase as they all headed to the elevator.

Once out of earshot Ben stood close to Reed and whispered, "He knew about NASA. Maybe he made the call to shut us down."

"Ben, think about all the people we can help if this works, Huh? Look, we got what we wanted. That's enough. A few days in space. It'll be great." Once she heard the word space, Nicole got very excited. She was smiling ear to ear and started vibrating in place. "What's the worst that can happen?" Reed finished and completely wiped the joy out of Nicole.

"Reed! Don't jinx us, man. What if we get explosive diarrhea in our suits?" As both of their expressions turn disgusted, she laughed.

"Just joking, but on the safe side don't eat anything bad for your old men stomachs." She dodges out of the way from Ben's lunge, giggling to the elevator.

As they were getting onto the elevator, Susan caught up with the group and stepped inside. "Reed, you should know those solar winds have been picking up speed." Was the first thing out of her mouth.

"I factored them into my coordinates," Reed told her smiling. _More like force me to do them while micromanaging what he wanted over my shoulder,_ thought Nicole as she remembers that week of hell.

Reed thought it would be a pleasant learning experience for Nicole to calculate the various storm outputs using his formulas. All she can say about it was that IT. WAS. HORRIBLE. She was, by no means a slacker. If the subject was interesting enough like most of the experiments Reed had her do, Nicole took to it like an eager beaver. She even remembered a memorable project just after she got hired, about maybe engineering a hover car.

Nicole had spent days studying engineering books just to figure out the mechanics of this part and that part to make the hovercar a reality. She even found documents about a hover car built in the 1940's by Howard Stark, which failed. It was an understatement to say that Nicole was sad when Reed changed his mind and discarded his plans to build it.

Shaking her thoughts of failed dreams, Nicole caught the sigh Ben released as Reed finished his sentence. Looking at the other female in the elevator, Nicole slyly took a step behind Ben to put him in between her and the evil look Susan was directing at Reed.

"Right. Of course, you did. In theory. It's a little different once you're out there." She turned away from him at this.

"I can assure you –" Reed tried.

"When are we leaving?" Ben interjected. From his voice, Nicole could tell that this sort of thing was something he went through many times before.

"Yeah, space! Totally awesome." Nicole grinned happily that the argument was diverted.

"I'll be scheduling the launch. You can call me in the morning for resources and crew." She gave Reed a business card.

"I think I remember the number," Reed told her.

"It's been changed." Nicole softly made a downward whistling sound before making a splat at the end as Ben nudged her. The smile on Reed's face fell off as he reached out and took the card while shooting Nicole an annoyed glare. She eeped and hid behind Ben.

Clearing his throat to get Reed's attention, Ben pointed to himself and Nicole before motioning to Susan with his eyes. A look a comprehension appeared in Reed's eyes before he stood next to Ben to present the idea to Susan.

"I was hoping Ben could pilot the mission. Along with bringing my assistant, Nicole to help me. She was a big help in conducting most of my research."

Susan gave them her full attention. "We already have a pilot on our payroll. But the both of you are welcome to come along. Remember my brother Johnny?" She gave off a pleased smile to the three of them.

Dumbstruck looks appeared on both males faces while Nicole only looked confused. With a short goodbye, Susan Storm waves them off the elevator. It was just when they arrived back at the Baxter building that Nicole explode.

"We're going to space! On a spaceship! Yes! You're the best bosses ever!" Gleefully she started skipping through the door saying 'hi' to the doorman.

It was only on their floor when Nicole turned around and got serious. "Is there something I'm supposed to know about the whole tension thing you got going on with Susan? And who's Johnny and why did you get those looks on your faces when she said he's going to be the pilot?"

Reed sighed as he ran a hand through his hair. Ben taking pity on her told Nicole in short terms that Susan and Reed used to date before, and Johnny was merely a little punk.

Seeing that they didn't elaborate any further on the subject, Nicole decided not to push it. "Well, I think this deserves comfort food. I'm ordering pizza! I'll even pay this time, catch ya on the flip side old mans!" And that was when the little hurricane Asian left them at the entrance to call her favorite pizza place.

"A lively one, isn't she?" Ben chuckled.

"She does make you happy in that sugary high kind of way. You can depend on her to make you smile after a hard day." Reed replied as he smiled.

With a laugh, they both followed her to the living room to get their inputs of the pizza toppings.

 **AN: Sort of filler that I wanted to flesh out. And I wanted to shout out to my first followers** _ **Luiz4200**_ **and** _ **Kurosnik**_ **for taking the time to read/review/follow my story! Thank you. Within the next couple of weeks, hopefully, I can draw what I imagine Nicole to look like when she uses her powers.**


	4. Cosmic Events

Disclaimer: I don't own anything. And this has not been Beta'd

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 _Italics_ = thoughts

 **Chapter 3**

"So, that's Johnny?" Nicole stated drily as she peered into a set of binoculars. "Are we safe with him flying us into space?" Nicole blinked rapidly as her eyes adjusted from using the binoculars. She rubbed her eyes to get them to focus again, only all it did was cause her contacts to move a little. Huffing she blinked to readjust them as she handed the binoculars to Reed before walking off.

As she walked off, Nicole heard Ben's and Reed argument about Johnny. Something about underwear and NASA. A weird image came into mind, of ugly old men in their underpants floated in her head. She shuddered as she dislodged that image. _Space, think about space! Zero gravity, space food and the empty space of nothingness!_ She chanted.

After asking for directions and being turned around a couple of times, Nicole arrived at the female locker-room. Once she got there, Nicole realized she didn't know what she was supposed to do. _Fuck._

"So, how long have you been with Reed?" A voice broke her chain of thought. It was Susan Storm, and she was holding out two garments for her. Taking the offering, Nicole replied,

"I was hired about two years ago to be a glorified gofer. He offered room and board, so I jumped on it." She shrugged and set her things down before stripping her street clothes. "This is really… form fitting. This won't show my underwear right?" Nicole said as she stretches the blue suit like a rubber band.

Susan chuckled, "No, surprisingly Victor took that into account when he designed the suits." Standing next to the cubicle Nicole was using, Susan began to change as well. It wasn't long for both women were dressed in the weirdly form-fitting suits with their hair pulled away from their faces.

Checking herself in the mirror only made Nicole frown. She hated constricting clothes. A quick glance at her face made Nicole inspect her eyes. She could see and feel her eyes drying out, Looking into her bag she grabbed her eye dropper, she dropped a few drops to rehydrate her eyes. She loves contacts honestly, but this brand seems to dry her out too fast. She would have worn her glasses if she could, but she didn't want to be restricted to them once all of them were in space. At least the blue rimmed contacts looked cute on her. It made the blue ring go nicely with her dark brown eyes.

Satisfied with her look, Nicole immediately put on the green suit over her blue one. Glancing towards the taller woman, she noticed that Susan only pulled up the zipper high enough that it gave her a low dip in her cleavage line. While she was envious of the confidence Susan had in her figure, Nicole was happy to say she still had a bigger bust than Susan. _I may be short, but I am mighty._ Nicole quickly looked away to prevent Susan from questioning her laughter.

"I have to ask, are you showing off the girls for Reed or Victor?" Nicole asked after she calmed down. Susan froze as she processed the question.

"What? No, no um." Stuttering, Susan couldn't put her answer into words, so Nicole decided to go easy on her. Patting her on the shoulder, Nicole just smiled. "It's okay. It's just a question I've been wondering since I met you. Your answer is safe with me. Between to two of us, I think Reed still likes you, but he can be a doofus now and then. So I wish you luck on that frontier." She quickly skedaddled out of the locker-room.

Inwardly laughing on the bit of chaos she caused, Nicole wondered what Reed would do to muck it up. Picking a random direction, Nicole hoped to find the guys. She wanted to see if Ben was in his suit so that she can poke fun at him. It may be mean of her, but she was still bitter that he won the rock, paper, scissors to determine who got to go into space first. Sadly she lost.

Two left turns, and a roundabout had Nicole confused until she finally bumped into Susan. "Ha ha? How you doin'?" At her unimpressed stare, Nicole faltered. "Sorry, I'm lost? Please help and send food. Ga-lu-nàa." Clapping her hands in front of her, she added a smile to her, please. Seeing a small tilt of Susan's lip go up, Nicole continued her antics to divert whatever Susan was going to do to her for the locker room incident. "I said I'm sorry and I'm lost. I even said please!"

"Just don't do it again." Susan chuckled before leading the lost Asian to the others. Nicole took what she can get as she followed the blond down the hall. It was after a few minutes of walking that both females heard the tail end of Ben's complaint.

"Victor did. The synthetics act as a second skin, adapting to your body's individual needs." Nicole amusedly watched as Susan strutted until she was in front of the guys, no doubt trying to get Reed's attention. While the focus was on her, Nicole walked unnoticed into the room where she could see everyone.

"See, now that means it keeps the hot stuff hot and the cool stuff cool." Said the man with short hair, as he told Ben patronizingly.

Nicole glanced curiously at him from her corner. This must be the 'punk' of the Storm siblings, Johnny. After seeing the buzz cut, blue eyes, and very broad shoulders, Nicole concluded that he was hot and he most likely used it to his advantage. In fact, he reminded her a lot of the guys she deployed with, while she was still in the Air Force. There was only just one thing that bugged her though. His face was really familiar, but she couldn't pin down where she saw him before.

She looked away from Johnny's visage before she was caught staring. It was beginning to annoy her how she couldn't remember why his face looked familiar. As she turns her head, she gave a little laugh as Reed totally fucked up his chance as he went on about unstable molecules.

It was the laugh that gave her away as Johnny was the first to notice her. "Well hello there, what's your name? The names Johnny" Quickly standing up, he walked over to her corner, before she could even blink. Taking her hand, he gave her a sweet kiss on the back of the palm as he glanced at her over.

So caught off guard, Nicole wasn't able to stop him. After a few seconds, she replied, "It's Nicole, nice to meet you, Ben told me so little about you Mr. Punk." Calmly she took her hand back and walked over to Ben who was trying to cover his laughs. Susan looked amused while Reed didn't know whether to laugh or stare confusedly at Susan. Poor Johnny was only able to pout when he didn't get the reaction he wanted.

Doom Space Station

 _I'm in space! Space, Space, Space!_ Nicole was tempted to skip down the hallway as she lugged a case of samples for the experiment, but knowing herself, she knew she would just end up tripping on the case thus breaking it.

It was officially the happiest day in her life, excluding graduating from basic training. Well, I guess that would count as more relief than happy for graduating and getting the hell out of Texas.

"E.T.A. until cosmic event, nine hours," Victor said importantly. Nicole was beginning to think that he only speaks just to hear his voice. It was this subject and that subject as he regaled Susan tales and occasionally talking high about himself the whole ride to the station. It was so much bullshit that Nicole had to con Ben out of his seat and enduring Johnny attempt at flirting with her. Well, the last part wasn't so bad, but it was the principal of the thing! Really, she's being honest….

Noticing that she was lagging behind, Nicole sped up and was behind Johnny and Ben, while they were ribbing each other.

"If you're good, maybe next time Daddy will let you drive." She heard as Johnny mockingly telling Ben.

"You keep talkin', and there won't be a next time," Ben grunted to him.

Grinning, Nicole followed after them. Maybe she can convince them to do a comedy skit at a local club. It'll be a slapstick comedy for sure.

Upon entering the control room, Nicole was amazed by all the electronics. As she walked by, Johnny offers her a charming smile, which turned into another pout when she ignored it. She found it funny that Johnny was so used to girls falling for him, that he never met anyone not interested in him. So, she made it her duty to make things difficult for him, and it absolutely had no connection what so ever to Susan's request of her, right before they launched into space. Ah, the joys of being the older sibling.

Switching the case to her other hand, Nicole walked over to Reed to find out where the case will be going. It was there that she happened upon the conversation between Victor and Ben, which had her scowling. When she went to defend Ben, Nicole got pinched by Reed who lightly pushed her in the direction of Johnny. "We don't need any more trouble. Just follow Ben and Johnny to the site." Huffing she did as she was told. Of course, that didn't stop her from thinking how to put a virus in Victor's personal computer. She would have to contact a friend when she gets back to Earth.

Johnny led the way towards an airlock where the experiment would take place. As the three walked, Johnny started talking.

"Please tell me your guy's not trying to rekindle things with my sister again." He said as he helped Ben unload his equipment.

Nicole was off to the side, setting up each individual plants with their corresponding case as she heard Ben replied back.

"Of course not, it's strictly business."

"Yes, well, his eyes say differently don't they?" Johnny shot back.

Nicole decided to interrupt, "So does hers." Both men looked towards her. Rolling her eyes, Nicole didn't bother to explain the whole strutting act Susan did. "Just trust me. It's so obvious."

"See. Two hearts got busted last time. Looks like she's not over it either." Ben told Johnny.

Looking straight into his eyes Johnny sassed back, "Wow, Dr. Phil, that's deep. Let's think about that." He turned away from Ben and walked in the other direction. "You got Victor – more money than God, stud of the year –" Here he grabbed the container from Nicole and winked at her, before walking back to Ben who was at the door. "-and you got Reed, world's dumbest smart guy, worth less than a postage stamp. That's a real toss-up."

"Don't trouble your tiny little mind," Ben told him.

"Don't wander off now, boy." Johnny walked out of the airlock chamber to stand next to Nicole who sulked at Ben. She was still upset that he won the bet. "Have fun gardening, you Jerk." Laughing Ben turned around as he stared out into the inky abyss.

Nicole stepped to the side to allow Johnny the room to operate the doors. Peering out the window, Ben took one last look at the two young adults with him. Johnny gave two thumbs up while Nicole waved at him. With a smile, he turned around as the doors opened up in front of him.

"I hate you so much Ben; I bet you cheated. You always lose at Rock, Paper, Scissors." She can hear the muffled laughter Ben let out which caused her to glower fiercely at the retreating back. Nicole then jumped when a hand touches her headset to turn it off. Looking at the offending appendage, she glared at the taller blond.

"You know if you really wanted to float around. I'm sure we could sneak off before we have to leave. Maybe even have some fun while we're at it." Johnny lifted his eyebrows at her. His charming smile was on full blast as he tried to persuade her.

Nicole looked at him, then at Ben who floated to his destination, and then back to Johnny. Biting her lip, she thought about it. _Reasoning:_ _On one hand this could jeopardize everything. But space! The childish side of her yelled out._

"Zero gravity." With another smile, Johnny cajoled her. He can see that the temptation was getting to her. It was like watching a little kid who was told they could get any toy they want, but only one.

"Ooh, but won't we get in trouble or something?" She fidgeted from foot to foot. She didn't want to give Reed a reason to fire her.

"Nah, babe. Even if we do, I'm sure I could put the old baby blues on Susan and she'll get us out of trouble." Wrapping an arm around her shoulders, Johnny found it a little amusing that her head was at the right height for him to rest his chin on.

He was positive the little Asian would seek retribution if he used her as a chin rest. "Think about it, we could float around, IN SPACE! I'm sure Victor's got some more suits lying around. Maybe he's hiding some jet packs around here too. Who knows what rich people do." Like a cheesy salesman, Johnny raised his hand up moving it from left to right as a way to further emphasize his point.

Nicole started laughing as she extracted herself from him. "Okay, okay, you got me. But, I'll only do it if you can find some jetpacks. Having fun at Doom's dime will be awesome."

Nicole reached up and turned her headset back on just in time as Reed's voice shouted in her ear. "Ben, get inside now!"

Seeing her wince Johnny turn his back on. "What's going on?" he asked Reed who skidded into the room. Ben's voice suddenly spoke on their headsets.

"I ain't done arranging your flowers yet, egghead!" Looking out of the window, all of them were horrified to see the cosmic energies right by the station.

"Ben, turn around." Reed urges Ben.

"No, don't turn around, jump back here! We gotta close the doors!" Nicole yelled.

Curious now, Ben did what anyone would do and looked behind him. Arcs of energy were hitting the station as Ben stood frozen with fear in his heart.

"Guys, I'm not gonna make it," Ben said discouraged.

"You gotta jump like Nicole said! It's the only way!" Johnny urged.

Stepping close to the console, Nicole tried to see if there was a wheeling system in place to grab a misplace astronaut only to find none. Desperate she tried looking everywhere before giving up. Coming back to the group, Nicole could only watch as the light and shadows flickered across her face as the storm crept closer to Ben.

"Come on, Ben! You got this!" Johnny frantically told him.

"Johnny, get ready to close the portal. Nicole move back and give Ben some room." Both did as told, Johnny heading back to the console and Nicole step into a shadowed corner next to him.

Nicole screamed out Ben's name along with Reed when the moment Ben leaped he was hit by a huge arc of energy and slammed against the window of the portal. Acting quickly, Johnny hit the closing mechanism on the portal after Ben was inside.

Tremors rocked the station as the cosmic storm fully engulf them all. All three of them could only watch as Ben was knocked unconscious while reaching out for Reed. Before they could do anything about Ben, a sudden light filtered into the chamber behind him. Reed looked up with his hand still on the glass as he was directly hit. The energy from the storm then traveled towards the other occupants, including Susan who arrived at the last minute. Strange and painful sensations racked all of them as the whole room was filled with the cosmic energy.

The last thing Nicole saw was red fire and Reed taking a direct hit in the face. Unable to keep her eyes open, she blacked out before seeing herself surrounded by moving black tendrils.


	5. It's Not A Ghost!

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Please excuse the grammar mistakes!**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 ** _Italics_ = thoughts**

 **Chapter 4**

Monitors bleeping was the only sound in the room as Johnny and Reed glanced at the only female occupant.

"She still out. She and Ben are the only ones who haven't woken up yet." Reed said as he wore a frown. Johnny looked at him and tried to ease his worry.

"Don't sweat it, man, Susan woke up, it won't be long before they do. You know, if you worry so much those gray hairs of yours will be all over your head. Though I do dig the new look on you." Reed couldn't figure out what he meant but resolved to look into it later.

A sudden noise caught the attention of both men when they both heard slight coughing and rustling of sheets. Their heads snapped towards the source of the sound to see Nicole glancing blearily at them while trying her best to sit up. Reed moved over and pressed a call button on the monitor before moving the bed in an upright position.

"What happened? I feel all ugh…" Blinking rapidly, her focus on Johnny faded in and out before she finally saw his smile. "Captain America!" she blurted out. The males in the room blinked as they traded confused glances. "That's why you look so familiar. You look just like him, but with a buzz cut on." She stopped short at this. "Wait… I can see you." Nicole frantically looked for a mirror and tried to get out of bed, but was pushed back by Reed.

"Hold it; you just woke up." He said sternly.

"But Reed." She whined, "I need a mirror!" Seeing that Nicole wouldn't stop struggling, Reed reached for a mirror beside them and gave it to her. Taking it from him, Nicole stared intently at the looking glass. What she saw freaked her out. Poking her eyes did not help her since Johnny held her hands away from her face after she touched them.

"Reed! The storm did something weird! I'm not wearing my contacts, yet I can see you so clearly! There's a blue ring around my eyes! Did I get mutated? I'm not going to get gills or turn purple am I?" She started freaking out before Johnny's hand covered her mouth.

Shocked, Nicole stilled as she blinked at the obstruction. She glared at Johnny when he didn't remove his hand. "Hey, cool your jets. I don't see a problem with this. Your eyes are too pretty anyway to be covered up." Blushing at the compliment, Nicole tried to glare him into submission, but he noticed immediately.

"You're blushing!" Taking his hand away, he leaned back and smirked at her. "Aww, is Miss Blushy embarrassed? Does she secretly like my compliments? That's it, isn't it?" He started chuckling. Finally, he caught her weakness.

Reed, seeing the look in her eyes stepped back. He wasn't disappointed to see her big white pillow thrown with a vengeance at the younger Storm, abruptly stopping his laughing fit. It was to this that the doctor walked in. "Are you disturbing my patient?" He sternly glared at Johnny who held his hands up sheepishly. Pointedly, he gestured for both men to get out, which they both did with post haste. Reed who wanted to check his notes on what Nicole told him and Johnny who wanted to get out of the doctor's way. That of course, didn't stop him from taking a quick kiss on the lips from Nicole. She was too shocked to consider throwing another pillow at him when he shouted over his shoulder, "I'll spangle your stars later, Miss Blushy." Quickly he ran out of the room after this. With a red face, the raven-haired woman turned to the doctor who raised his eyebrows at her.

"You seemed to be recovering just fine if you can throw a pillow that hard." The doctor said amusedly. Nicole didn't say anything, as she was still embarrassed by what happened. After taking her temperature and remarking about how abnormally cool her skin felt, Nicole was given a clean bill of health even after her concerns about her sudden return to 20/20 vision. Besides the unusual color change and vision, she was only regulated to stay at the hospital for further observation, as nothing else seems to be wrong.

With a pat on the shoulder, the doctor turned to leave the room, but not before throwing out, "If you're worried, don't be. Your fit enough to have your stars spangled later." Nicole spluttered as the doctor left with a twinkle in his eye. "Why is everyone picking on me!?" Nicole tugged her blanket over her head, unwilling to face anyone else today.

A few hours had passed before Nicole was ready to face the world again. But not before a nice scalding hot shower. She wanted to be freshly clean for when she finds Johnny and dump the glitter found in her bag onto him. All she needed was to get some borax, glue, and water to mix it. It will be glorious. _Mwhahaha!_

She stopped her evil mental laugh when all the lights in her room started to flicker. Confused, Nicole looked around the room as all of the electronics flashed repeatedly. Heart racing, she said _nope_ and left the room.

 _Faulty wiring, that's it. Nothing to worry about._ Willing herself to breathe normally didn't help with Nicole's anxiety as it only made it worse. _No ghost here. Nope._ An overhead light bulb burst as the light above her extinguished. Freaking out, she started running as all the lights around her went dark. Unnoticed to Nicole, the rest of her brown eyes began to glow blue, and her shadow thickens underneath her.

 _Fuck this shit, I'm the only minority I see, and I don't feel like dying!_

Not paying attention to where she was going, it only made sense that Nicole was knocked off her feet from a collision of…boxes?

"Whoa, where's the fire? If you _**really**_ wanted to see the stars and stripes, I could've shown you a different way to see it. You know, with less clothing." Johnny said in an obnoxious tone of voice.

"Nothing! Just trying to warm up. It's freezing in here." She replied as she tried to even her breathing. Checking her pockets, she was disappointed to see that she forgot to grab the glitter. Setting his boxes on the ground, Johnny pulled Nicole up on her feet before frowning.

"Geez, your hands are cold. We should get you some gloves. In fact…" After looking at her hands and then to the boxes, Johnny had a smile on his face. He released one of his hands to grab his packages in a one arm grip before tugging Nicole back in the direction she came from.

"What?! I just came from there, why are we going back?" She tried to pull her hand back, but Johnny had a tight hold on her and his boxes. Even when she tried to slip her wrist in a downward fashion at the finger and thumb area didn't work as it should have. His tight grip on her wrist and the tugging motion gave him more power in his hold so that she couldn't escape. Nicole just glowered at him before giving up. Johnny had just volunteered to be the decoy for her escape of the hallway of doom.

After a nerve-racking few minutes down the hall and eyeing suspicious lighting, they arrived back at her room with no fuss at all. Setting his things down on the bed, Johnny turned around and locked the door before opening his boxes. Warily, she stayed by the window side as a quick escape route as she watched the lights and Johnny.

"Johnny, why are we here?" She folded her arms as she questioned him. He ignored her as he pulled a few blue colored items and shoving it into her arms. "Just changed into those. They're Susan's." Nicole started to protest but was pushed into her adjoining bathroom to change. Grumbling, she followed his instructions. The shirt and jacket were a little tight in the chest area, and the pants were too long.

She came out of the bathroom fully dress to see Johnny dressed in similar gear, only in red. "Susan's clothes are too tight in the chest." She told him sullenly, as she was yet again dragged out of the room.

"What?" Johnny did a double check, "That's nice to know." A smile appeared on his face as he looked at her. "Come on; we got to get the other stuff before we leave." Looking down the hallways for any wayward medical personnel, Johnny led Nicole back to his room after watching a nurse leave in the other direction. He took this time to appreciate the swing of her hips. After the coast was clear, they both went in so Johnny can grab his snowboard and the attachments. "Susan should have her skis with her. Let's go." Resigned, Nicole followed him without protest.

"I don't know how to ski or anything besides sledding." She told him flatly after taking Susan's things.

"It ain't that hard." Johnny scoffed, as he led them both away with Susan's things and hitched a ride up the mountain.

"If I break my leg, I'm going to break yours."


	6. On Fire

Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Please excuse the grammar mistakes!

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 _Italics_ = thoughts

 **Chapter 5**

After Johnny had spent most of the hour laughing at her instead of teaching, Nicole finally gained a novice skill of skiing. (Level up!) It was when she got the basics down, Johnny decided that she was ready for the big leagues. Basically his version of the sink or swim.

White covered mountains full of fluffy snow stared back at her as they flew closer. Apprehensively, Nicole looked down at the beautiful scenery. It was a beautiful day to break her legs. She was totally not prepared for this. Nicole jumped when Johnny put his arm around her shoulders as he looked out of the helicopter. "Don't sweat it grasshopper, you'll do fine."

Jabbing his side with her fingers, she glared at him. "Just because I'm Asian doesn't mean you get to call me grasshopper. You barely taught me anything besides how best to fall on my face." Seeing him fight off another bout of laughter had her puffing her cheeks at him and turning to the opposite direction.

"Aww, don't be like that. Just stick to the right, the left will give you some trouble. Hey, you mind dropping 10 more feet?" he directed to the pilot who nodded.

Slipping on the googles, Nicole looked down as she felt the elevation drop. With a surge of adrenaline in her veins, she decided to get this over with and get back to the facility. She was in some serious need of hot chocolate. "Bye!" she shouted. Grabbing her skis she jumped off the edge of the helicopter and landed on her feet. Barely.

Disregarding Johnny's advice, Nicole wanted to see how she'll fare against a harder slope than the bunny one she practiced on. With a wide grin on her face, she sped away.

Being careful, she avoided most of the big jumps until she saw Johnny fly past her.

"Last one there is a rotten egg!" he yelled over his shoulder.

Grinning at the challenge, Nicole tried to catch up to him, but he was too fast.

"Hey, check this out!" He did a flip showing off for her. It was then that Nicole noticed that smoke was coming off of him.

"Johnny you're on fire!"

"Thanks! Don't worry you'll be as great as me soon!" Ignoring his smug tone, Nicole saw flames starting to build up and she started to panic.

"No, you idiot! You're on fire! Stop, drop, roll!" she ordered.

Looking down, Johnny saw the reason for her fear. Patting himself quickly only seemed to make it worse before he eventually lost control and flew off a large cliff. The only thing Nicole heard was his yells before a loud "Whoosh!"

Navigating away from the cliff, she tried to look for the quickest way to him. Fear for Johnny was the only thing on her mind as she made her way towards him, not noticing how her shadow begins to thicken and expand. Though she couldn't help but shiver as her speed increased before she tumbled to a stop at her destination.

"Whoa!" Nicole fell face first into the snow, twisting her ankle. Wincing at the pain, she did a quick check to see if it was broken. Luckily, she didn't break anything. Gingerly, she undid the skis and detected the steam rising over her head.

Half climbing and half crawling, she made her way up to where she thought Johnny landed leaving skis behind her. There, in a pool of hot water was Johnny freaking out as steam rose off his body and the water. He held his hands in the air looking to his left, then the right before looking up at her.

"Care to join me, Blushy?" He said breathlessly.

Annoyed at his remark and seeing that he was back to a semi-normal state albeit steaming, Nicole balled up a buncha snow and launched it at him. She was pleased to see it landed on his well-defined chest that she was totally ignoring. As she predicted, the ball of snow quickly melted into water once it made contact.

"Dude, you were just on fire. Why the hell would I want to join you when you can self-combust at any moment? You're supposed to be charred bits right now." Giving him another glance, she didn't detect any more flames coming off of him.

"As appealing as hot bath sounds, we need to see the others; maybe the same thing happened to them." Climbing up the small slope, she made her way to Johnny before shedding her jacket and offering it to him. "Here, nakie time is over."

Heaving a big dramatic sigh, Johnny reaches out to take the jacket from her. Right before he did though, he smirked and pulled her into the water. She cried out before falling in and making a big splash. "I think nakie time just went to overtime." He smirked at her as she spluttered and wiped the heated water from her eyes to look at him.

The evil look she gave him though made him drop his smug grin. In fact, it was so evil, it looked like her eyes glowed. He yelped when he realized that yes, her eyes are glowing an eerily luminescent blue. "Johnny." Her voice was low as she said his name. He backed up to the edge of the spring he created when he saw dark shadows rise up behind her.

"You jackass!" Large black tendrils erupted from her as they lifted him and threw him out of the water. Johnny landed on his back before he saw a large pile of snow above him.

"Oh, shi-!" The snow pile landed on him coving him from the neck, all the way down to his feet. Only his head was visible now. Turning his head as far back as he could, Johnny saw the misty tendrils retreat back to the spring.

There was silence on the mountain as both of them processed what just happened. Johnny, tired of being buried, wiggled himself free from his prison; unconsciously raising his temperature and turning the snow into mush. Glancing at himself in awe, he stood up and cautiously walked up to the water, not even concerned with his own nakedness.

The roles reversed as he saw a scared Nicole hugging herself while shivering. "Johnny? I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you." She whispered, looking away from him.

Jumping back into the pool, Johnny waded his way to her. Ignoring her flinch, he held her close. With his arms wrapped around her, Johnny rested his chin on her head (Ha! He was right!) as he patted her back.

"Hey, it's fine. Nothing hurts. By the way, that was awesome! Not as awesome as me, of course." He felt Nicole laugh into his chest before hugging him in thanks. After a few seconds, Johnny pulled back from the hug to look her in the eyes. "It was an accident. We'll just leave it behind us." Smiling, she agreed.

There was a moment of silence between them as they pondered what happened. It was then that Johnny realized his opportunity. Before she can react, Johnny quickly leaned down and stole another kiss from her. Nicole let out a muffled gasp which he used to deepen his kiss. Dominating her, Johnny walked her backward until her back was against the snow.

Moaning into the kiss, Nicole dazedly closed her eyes as the heat emanating from him seeped into her body. The cold feeling she felt from using whatever it was to throw Johnny went away, as her body greedily absorb his heat. Hearing the little moan from her throat had Johnny's blood pumping for more. Using his hands, he cupped her ass and settled himself neatly in between her legs.

Nicole trembled when she felt a warm caress across her breast. Jerking from her daze, Nicole broke from the kiss when she realized that Johnny had unlatched her bra and was touching her skin. Panting, she tried to catch her breath but moaned as Johnny's lips trailed down her neck while using his right hand to knead her breast. It was only when she felt the unmistakable bulge between her legs that she realized the position they were in. Freaking out, Nicole started slapping his shoulders yelling, "Stop, stop! You're naked, you doofus!"

"Why yes, yes I am. And you're about to see stars." Johnny went to pull her in for another kiss, but he let out a grunt as he was pushed away by Nicole's shadows. Getting his bearing back, Johnny saw Nicole scrambling out of the hole. "I-I am not doing anything with you, y-you pervert!"

Grinning, he yelled back, "You can't deny what you want!" All he got for his troubles was Susan's wet blue jacket to the face.

The ride back in the helicopter was uncomfortable. Besides the silence, all that happened was a red-face Nicole shoving the emergency blanket at a smirking Johnny to give him more cover. (Johnny: 'You just want me for yourself!' The answer he got was the blanket to the face.) The pilot had to restrain himself from asking them questions. And boy did he had questions. But this story isn't about him.

In no time at all, Johnny and Nicole arrived back and began their search for the others. They quickly found Reed and Susan in the dining area and walked past the questioning hospital staff. More than a few females and the occasional male gave an appreciative glance at Johnny and his reflective blanket wrapped around his hips. The jacket was also wrapped around his waist as well to secure it in place.

"Hey, you guys – Hey." Johnny smiles and looked at the waitress before turning back at Reed and Susan. Irritated at his one track mind, Nicole strolled past him and walked closer to the others.

"You are never gonna believe what just happened to us. What?" Johnny exclaimed.

"They're probably wondering why you're naked, dumb ass," Nicole told him with a sigh.

"Oh. Well, I can explain this." Johnny said as he looked down at himself.

"Maybe we should have grabbed you some clothes." She glanced back at her boss's and Susan's stunned face.


	7. Gifts of explosions

**Disclaimer: I don't own the franchise otherwise I would be rich**

 _ **Italics**_ **= thoughts**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **This is self-beta.**

 **A/N: I'm not too happy with some parts of this chapter, but I hope you enjoy it. And thank you, everyone, who alerted/favorited my story!**

 **Chapter 6**

A door was slammed open as four people marched down the hallway at a brisk pace.

"It has to be the cloud. It's fundamentally altered our D.N.A." Susan looked at Reed as she said this.

"Let's not jumped to conclusions." Reed tried to calm her down.

Behind them, Nicole watched fascinated; as Johnny kept on snapping his fingers to make a fire flicker into existence upon his thumb. After a few tries, he was finally able to get a flame to stay lit. With an amazed look on his face, he grinned at his accomplishment.

"We need a massive amount of evidence before making that leap." the tallest of them said.

"Whoa! Guys, look." Both of the scientists looked back as Johnny and Nicole caught up to them; Johnny had to adjust his cover a little, as he wobbled up to them.

Snapping his fingers again he made his thumb light up like a zippo, turning it off and on again. With a wide smile on his face, he looked towards the other half of the group.

"Now, picture that, but everywhere!" He used his hand to further emphasize his point. "It was everywhere! What?" Johnny exclaimed.

Susan turned to Reed with an expectant look on her face. With a slightly defeated look, Reed opened his mouth to speak. Unfortunately, he was interrupted once again.

Nicole, who was silent up to this point, was still transfixed by the tiny flame. It felt like she can sense the heat of the fire emitting from Johnny, and she wanted it.

With his thumb still on fire, Johnny was still admiring his thumb when a smaller feminine hand reached out and touch the flame, "Hey!"

The three bystanders watched as the small flame didn't seem to harm the other female. In fact, it seemed like it was getting weaker. With a concentrated look on her face, Nicole's eyes started to emit a weak blue hue and a black mist appeared around her hand snuffing out the flame. The blue in her eyes grew brighter as Nicole pulled her hand back to stare at it. The black mist that surrounded her hand grew darker and morphed into black tendrils wrapping around her hand like vines.

The group stood agape, not knowing what to do. Seeing that she was still transfixed with her hand, Johnny reached out and touch Nicole to bring her out of her stupor. Unfortunately, that seemed to startle her violently.

The short Asian seem to jump a foot in the air, as the lazy tendrils wrapped around her hand seem to explode outward. Luckily, it didn't hit anyone when the tendrils hit the lights and electronics around her. Everything it touched seemed to have the light sucked right out of them and the immediate area around Nicole was plunged into darkness.

Looking around herself all she could say was, "Uh, oops?" with a sheepish look.

"And she does that! She even threw buried me in snow earlier." Johnny crowed to them, as he went back to snapping his fingers.

Seeing another flame appear on Johnny caused Nicole's gaze to snap to him. Wanting to feel the same energizing rush she got when she absorbed the fire, she reached out and stole that flame too.

"Hey! That's mine!" Johnny said squawked, as he turned his back towards her and lit his thumb again.

"Didn't you say something about not denying what I want?" As she tried to swipe the flame.

"Not like that!" The two bantered light-heartedly back and forth, as Nicole tried to steal more fire and Johnny blocking her attempts. He even went so far to hold his hand above his head and watched amusedly as Nicole tried in vain to get it from him.

Rubbing the area between his eyes, Reed glanced at the darkened area around his assistant; and the dim lights over their heads. Reluctantly, he turned to Susan and said, "The cloud has fundamentally altered our D.N.A." Reed looked pained to admit it, as Johnny and Nicole paused their fight.

"Cool." They both said simultaneously.

"And you know what, guys? I think I was flying." Johnny said as he thought back to the incident on the mountain.

Nicole scoffed, "More like falling with style." bursting his bubble.

"No, flying." He looked back to the smaller woman and he stressed the word flying.

"You can't call it flying unless you control it. At most you could say was you glided before crashing. So falling." She argued back.

Tired of their squabbling Reed interrupted them, "We need to find Ben."

Arguments set aside, the four of them rushed down the hall to find Ben. Along the way, Johnny went back to practicing his zippo skills.

Fed up with the constant snapping, Susan turned to her brother, "I said cut it out, Johnny."

Deciding not to get into that mess, Nicole stood next to Reed and watched the siblings fight. A small smile making way to her face as Johnny mocked Susan before she turned around.

"Hey, Ben! It's Reed!" Pounding at the door, Reed turned to Susan.

"Sue, do you know the code?"

A loud crash that sounded like shattering glass was heard, and Susan rushed to the monitor by the door.

"Ben, it's us. Open up!" Nicole tried her best to get her colleague to open the door.

"You all right, Ben?"

Johnny looked around him to find someone who can help, "Hey does somebody have keys to the doors? Anybody?" When no one answered him, he suggested, "Just break the glass, it can't be that thick."

The two siblings and one assistant looked questioningly when Reed kneeled down and laid his hand at the gap under the door. Stunned, they watched as Reed's hand seem to go under the door stretching and unlocking the door. After retracting his hand he stood up quickly to look back at the others.

"Ewww."

"That's gross."

Both the younger adults of the group said pulling grossed-out faces at Reed who only gave them an irritated look before the building rumbled as a loud crash was heard.

Shoving the door open, Reed was the first in to witness the destruction of Ben's room. Alarms were beeping as they saw a huge gaping hole in the wall.

"Ben?"

"Look! Look, look, look, look!" Johnny pointed out of the newly made hole. There they saw a big shaped humanoid moving through the trees. "What is that thing?" They moved closer to see it.

"Is that Ben?" Nicole whispered to the others.

"What's going on? What happened in here?" They heard a voice from behind them. Turning around they saw Victor in the doorway messing with the cuffs in his suit.

"Victor, are you feeling all right?" Susan walked over to him looking concerned.

"I'm fine. Just a few scrapes, that's all." He waved off her concern.

Butting into their conversation, Reed interjected, "Ben did this. He had some kind of reaction to exposure from the cloud."

Susan nodded, "We all have, um, different symptoms."

"Symptoms?" Victor questioned her.

"Victor, um, I should have-"

"Just find him." He then walked away from her.

"Anybody got any ideas where the big guy's going?" Johnny asked everyone as he leaned against the wall.

"Well he's running, that's all we know," Nicole answered him.

Reed sighed as he looked down before realization hit him. "He's going home."

"We're a long way from home," Nicole said sadly, as she picked up the picture.

Scene change

It was a long flight back to New York and the four of them were stuck in traffic in a cramped cab. Reed was in passenger with Johnny behind him. Susan, behind the driver and Nicole, the smallest of them, drew the short straw was stuck in the middle.

Not that she was complaining, she had already fallen asleep and was resting her head on Johnny's warm shoulder already feeling better. On their way back to New York in Victor's private plane, Johnny and her took turns thinking on what to do with her powers. From creating shadow puppets to shooting paper balls into wastebaskets, they had a blast experimenting. Unfortunately, it seemed that after mere hours of practicing, Nicole had passed out from fatigue.

They had realized too late that the longer Nicole used her powers the more tired and pale she got. Panicking slightly, with no doctor in sight, Reed came up with a quick solution of using Johnny to help her. Johnny had the pleasure of cuddling up to the unconscious Asian warming her body in the most platonic way, much to his disappointment, as Susan kept her stern eye on him. Never the less, Johnny shared his body heat with Nicole and used his body as a filter for her to absorb the energy in her sleep.

For all his hard work, Nicole was able to wake up in time for the plane to land. Still a little drowsy, Nicole's natural blush returned to her checks and her pale skin returned to the natural tan she normally sported. She was pretty embarrassed after she was told what happened, and couldn't look at anyone in the eyes. Safe to say, this gave more fodder for Johnny to use in order to tease her with.

It was when they were crossing a bridge, all occupants of the cab were jostled out of their seats as the taxi suddenly halted. Nicole jerked awake and would have fallen out of her seat if it wasn't for the seatbelt. Looking out of the windows the saw that they weren't the only ones who had to break.

Johnny and Reed were the first ones out of the cab with the females following. Screaming and shouts of, 'What's Happened?" echoed across the bridge.

Following Reed, they made it near the front of the crowd. The smell of fuel was potent in the air.

"What are we going to do now?" Sue asked.

"We're not going to get past these guys." Reed looked around before he turned to Susan with his eyes widening. "But you could."

Susan gave him a look before following his plan and disappearing.

"Sue, your clothes. Lose them."

"Oh, right." And she started taking her clothes off. Nicole had a sneaking suspicion that Reed was starting to enjoy this as they watched Susan strip.

"This is so wrong." Johnny turned away. Nicole could only feel embarrassment for her fellow female and respectively covered her eyes with her hands.

"Oh!" At Johnny's shout, she peaked through her fingers and noticed that the crowd around them had noticed clothes that seemed float in the air.

Susan, feeling the stares on her, reappeared and covered herself.

"Wow. You've been working out. Ouch!" Reed yelped as Nicole jumped up to smack his head.

"Thank you, Nicole." Covering herself with her jacket she gave an irritated glare at Reed.

"Any more great ideas? Why don't you strip down and have 100 people stare at you?" Her angry shout caused her to fade back into invisibility.

"Sue."

"What? Oh. Hmph!" With an angry noise, she finished disrobing.

Nicole leaned down and picked up her clothes overhearing Johnny mumbling about needing therapy. She snickered at him.

"Come on. Let's get out of here." Quickly, Reed led the way following Susan's invisible voice as she pushed people out of the way… Nakedly.

Reaching to an open area, Nicole felt the clothes in her hands being yanked away by the invisible Susan who redressed herself.

"I still can't believe you made me do that." Susan reappeared again when she was modest.

"We got through, didn't we? Just find Ben." Nicole felt it best for her health that she didn't mention that they could have done the same thing, and pushed people out of the way without Susan going invisible. It wasn't like the police did anything to the three of them that were still visible.

Reed rushed off following through with his own order and the other three rushed to do the same.

Susan was the first to find Ben, as she stood atop of a car shouting his name.

Johnny, having taken a different direction of the car wrecks, head a voice calling out 'Mom?' He turned to see a little girl near an open flame next to a flammable container. Seeing the danger she was in, Johnny ran across the cars and managed to reach the girl in time before an explosion rocked the bridge.

Cars flipped and fire had exploded everywhere. Eyes widening, Nicole held out her arms in front of her; fearing for her life. The familiar feeling of heat Johnny's fire filled her again, as her shadow rose from behind her and covered her entire form.

The flames exploded outward, and not a spark of it harmed her. Instead of burning her alive, she absorbed the heat. As she absorbed the flame she could practically feel the burning light her eyes gave off. Unlike Johnny's fire, the chemical flames didn't bring a soothing warmth. It felt more like a burning tingling she got when she was given a local anesthesia once. Except it was all over and it burned at her eyes.

To the right of her, Johnny was absorbing the flames around him as well. He curled his form protectively over the little girl as his body protected both of them.

With Susan, she had managed to force back the flames from herself; creating a force shield that she pushed against the flames. Eventually, she extinguished the flames from her immediate area.

As the flame died around them and there was no more fire to absorbed, Nicole held a hand to her chest and tried to calm her rapidly beating heart. Still, in shock that she survived, Nicole let out a gasp as she looked down and saw her body covered in black. Before she could process this new development she saw through the corner of her eyes Johnny running pass her towards the fire truck. The truck itself was half off the bridge and about to plunge into the water.

As she ran, Nicole saw a fireman lose his grip and fell. Luckily Reed was able to save him. Stopping in front of the truck, Nicole saw what she thought was Ben holding onto the grill of the fire engine. Hoping she could make this work, the Asian concentrated on her shadows, willing it to listen to her.

Imagining the feeling she had when she was on the mountain, Nicole saw swirls of black mist form around her before it condensed to form tendrils connecting her to the truck.

Her powers were slow in the beginning, and then as quick as lighting, it latched onto the rest of truck. Her tendrils even went so far as to anchor the firemen in place as it enveloped the whole vehicle. With her help, Ben managed to heave the now black fire engine back onto the bridge to the relief of the men and one dog. Relaxing his grip, Ben let go of the truck. Seeing the truck was safely in place, Nicole lifted the firemen she anchored in the air and set them safely on the ground.

She heaved out a big sigh now that the danger was over. What little concentration she had left snapped, and her shadows disappeared into mist and reveal her true form. Even with her shadows gone, Nicole could still feel her eyes trying to burn through the leftover energy she had. She tried rubbing her eyes to get the tingling feeling to go away, but to no luck on that.

Nicole was eventually distracted from her eyes when she almost fell over. Ben, the cause of her almost accident, poked his giant rock finger into her side, painfully. Peeved, she was about to give him a piece of her mind for running off, until she noticed that they were surrounded.

"Ah, hell." She said annoyed.


	8. The Fantastic Five

**Disclaimer: I don't own the franchise. If I did, I would be rich.**

 _ **Italics**_ **= thoughts**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **This is self-beta.**

 **A/N: I'm sorry for the delay, but I had summer finals. I also just found out that I passed the PAX in the 72 percentile earning myself a spot in the Nursing Program at my school. I can't wait. I start next Fall. Thank you all so much for those who reviewed and followed me. I even got favorited a couple of times! Thank you again!**

 **Chapter 7**

"This is the police! Get down on the ground!" The police bullhorn sounded.

"Don't Shoot! They're heroes!" Someone from the crowd shouted.

The officer ignored them, "Get down on the ground, now!"

Putting her hands in the air, Nicole looked up at Ben who stared at the ground. Suddenly, clapping was heard, as the firemen descended on the policemen; telling them to stand down. The crowd cheered and clapped for their heroes.

"Hey Ben," Nicole smiled at him, "You're a hero." She laughed and raised Ben's big arm in the air like he won a tournament and the bystanders ate it up. "That's was cool. I always wanted to do that."

"Ben!" Ben's and Nicole's head snapped over to Reed to see him and the others blocked by a policeman. Walking away from Ben, Nicole quickly made her way over to help. As she reached her companions, she didn't see that someone catching Ben's eye.

Nicole tapped the officer on the shoulder to catch his attention, "It's alright sir. These three are with us." as she pointing to Reed, Johnny, and Susan. The man nodded and let them through.

As Nicole looked to Ben, she turned just in time to see Debbie had placed her engagement ring on the ground, and walking away. Devastated, Ben walked over to the ring and tried to pick it up. Reed, not being able to stand it anymore, picked it up for him while whispering something to him.

* * *

Annoyed, Nicole sat in the corner of the tent with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. The cause of the annoyance was the paramedic next to her. The paramedic had stuck a thermometer in her mouth and was holding her arm captive to take her blood pressure. Now normally, Nicole wouldn't have a problem with this. She likes talking to paramedics. It's just that this one wasn't listening to a word she said. The woman kept on insisting that Nicole was in shock, and needed to follow her instructions.

Fed up with the treatment, Nicole knew she had to stop this, "I told you already, I'm fine! There's nothing wrong with me. Apparently, it`s a thing that comes with having superpowers. Here, take this," she shoved the thermometer and the cuff back at the rude woman, "and we can call it a day." The lady huffed at her angrily and stomped off, all the while muttering about ungrateful brats. When the lady wasn't looking, Nicole stuck out her tongue at her.

On her left, Johnny snickered as he watched her. He was the one who directed the paramedic her way. Scowling, she rolled up her blanketon her and threw it at him. The ball didn't even touch him as he neatly dodged it. With a laugh, Johnny turned away from her and looked towards Ben.

A puzzled look came to his face.

"Where are your ears?"

Ben gave him what Nicole thought was an irritated look, as Johnny merely looked questioningly. So Nicole got up and swatted Johnny for Ben. Well, partly for herself, not just for Ben.

"There are some folks outside that want to talk to you." said a fire chief walking to Reed.

Reed stared a bit before he realized the chief was talking to him, "We're not going public. We're scientists, not celebrities."

"I'm just an assistant!" Nicole raised her hand and piped up from her spot next to Johnny.

Seeing Nicole raise her hand, Johnny took the opportunity and poke her in the side. "Eep!" A loud 'Smack!' was heard, as Nicole slapped Johnny.

They all turned back to see Johnny rubbing his check. With a cheeky grin, he said, "I would so do that again."

Nicole huffed at him, glaring. Not to be outdone, Johnny crossed his arms and huffed right back at her. It turned into a contest of wills, as they glared each other down.

Rolling his eyes at the two, Reed turned back to the Chief.

"We're not celebrities."

"It's too late, son. Look." The stocky fire chief turned on the conveniently placed TV that was airing the local Channel 5 Fox News.

The main headline was 'The Fantastic Five.' As they listened to the reporter they saw a picture of themselves live on television news.

"That's what they're calling you – The Fantastic Five." Nicole wrinkled her nose. _Is that the best they could come up with?_

"Cool!" Johnny was almost out of the tent before Susan stopped him.

"No, Wait! Where are you going?" She yelled at him.

"I'm gonna go talk to 'em." Johnny didn't see a problem with this.

"No! We should think this through." Calmly, she turned around, not wanting to blow up at her brother in front of an audience.

"That's great. Brainstorm." Nicole watched amusedly, as Johnny slowly backed away from the tent. With a flirty wink to her, he bolted out of the tent.

"You guys know that he left right?" She asked the people around her.

As if to prove her point, they can hear Johnny asking where the newscast was. Alarmed, both scientists rushed out the door with Ben following behind. Nicole sigh. She had to walk.

Leisurely, she arrived just in time for Reed to step up and speak to the reporters. Nicole slid next to Susan and watched as Reed made his … speech.

"Uh… during our recent mission to the Von Doom Space Station. We were exposed to as-yet unidentified radioactive energy." He began.

"What happened on the bridge?"

"How can you stretch?"

"Is it true you can fly?"

Johnny flashed a quick smile at the camera as he interjected, "Yeah, I'm working on it. It's actually difficult-"

Before Johnny could get an even bigger ego, Nicole thought it was best to nip it in a bud. "He actually just falls rather than fly." Turning to look at him, "I told you, you can't call it flying if all you do is flail around screaming." The reporters shared a laugh at the look on Johnny's face.

"Hey." The smile slipped off his face as once again, Nicole popped his inflated ego bubble. Susan was quick intervene before they could continue their debate from earlier.

"No, actually, we do not know much more than you do at this point. We'll be going directly to our lab to diagnose our symptoms."

"Symptoms? Is this some kind of disease?" A reporter asked, afraid.

"No! No, no, no. It's not a disease." With his hands on his hips, Johnny proudly puffed up his chest to the reporters.

"Symptoms? If having special powers is a disease, then, yeah, we got it bad."

Both Susan and Reed tried to give him a stern look, but he ignored it.

"Miss! Miss! What is it you could do? It was amazing!" A reporter managed to stretch a microphone to Nicole who blinked at him surprised.

"Well… It looks like I absorb light and heat which fuels my shadows? I think the proper term is Umbra kinesis." Nicole brought up pointer finger and tapped it against her lips as she thought about it. "I'm not really sure, but that's why we're going to be testing our powers to see what happened to us during the storm." Nicole thought she was laying it on pretty thick when she gave the reporter an innocent smile, but they all seem to eat it up.

"Excuse me. That thing doesn't look so fantastic." Was heard from a sourly looking reporter as he pointed to Ben. All cameras were directed at Ben who moved forward menacingly. Firmly, Reed held him back and looked at the reporter and said, "Ben Grimm is a genuine American Hero.-"

An arm wrapped around Ben as Johnny stopped Reed mid-sentence.

"What he means is, every team needs a mascot." Laughs all around erupted, and Sue looked ready to throttle her brother with Reed and Ben not too far behind. Nicole sighed and looked up as if to ask the sky if it could help her deal with this.

"A new day is dawning. The day of the Fantastic Five!" At Johnny's announcement, it was like a tidal wave of questions crashed around them.

Frustrated that this press conference was going nowhere, Reed had had enough. "Look- Look, we went up to space to find a way to understand D.N.A., cure disease, save lives. Well, now it's our D.N.A., our 'disease," our lives on the line. Thank you. No more questions." Reed finished.

* * *

"Oh geez. Look at that crowd." Nicole looked out of her window of the passenger seat. She opted to ride in the same van that Ben had hitched a ride in. Nicole rather not have another argument with the flirty Storm.

"At least they love you, instead of hate you." The driver, Kevin who was a nice policeman, said to her.

"Thank god it's not that." The passenger door opened much to her surprise, as another officer opened the door for her.

"Thank you!" Nicole beamed at him. She hopped down from the police van and made her way to the front of the building. Behind her, Nicole heard the tell-tale stomping that she come to associate with Ben, following after her.

Ben, with his longer stride, had just caught up to her when Johnny fell in step with them. The police escort that followed 'The Fantastic Five' acted as crowd control, holding back the fans before they could be ambushed.

"Come on, Ben. Smile. They wanna like you bud. Say hi." Johnny urged Ben, pointing out the little kids who stared at the local heroes. The crowd around them quieted when they saw Ben staring at the wide-eyed children before him. With bated breath, they waited to see what the orange man would do.

"Whoa" uttered the kids as one.

Nervous, and out of his element, Ben spouted the first thing to come to his mind. "Uh, don't do drugs!" The masses around them started cheering when Ben finished his Good Samaritan message.

Nicole laughed as Ben ducked his head and turned towards the entrance doors. She was about to walk after him when a small hand tugged her shirt.

The culprit, a little brown-haired boy had snuck out of the line and was standing before her with his hand held out. Dressed in a Superman shirt and blue jeans, the pre-school kid just looked adorable. Squealing, Nicole kneeled down and gave him a big hug.

"Aww! You are just adorable! Is Superman your favorite superhero? Where's your mommy?"

"Sammy? Sammy!" Nicole heard the shouts of a frantic woman from the crowd. Looking around, Nicole spotted the frazzled mother who looked similar to the little boy before her. Leading the boy by the hand, Nicole walks him over to the woman who had a look of relief wash over her.

"You shouldn't walk away from your momma, okay?" The boy didn't say anything, as he shyly ducked his head into his mother's skirt. The little boy was embarrassed at being the center of attention.

"Thank you so much, Sammy must have gotten away from me when he saw you walk by. I guess he was excited when he saw you all." The mother told her.

"Don't mention it. I love kids." With a little wave at Sammy, Nicole walked inside before any other mischievous children got the same idea to run from their parents.

"Aww, you like kids?" Johnny teased her when she stepped through the doors. "I think you blew up the cameras squealing like that."

"Careful, dek nai khongthan is showing." She pointed at his chest and waited for him to look down. When he did, she brought her finger up and flicked his nose before running to one of the open elevators.

Surprised, Johnny ran after her just as she got into the elevator. Nicole, not wanting to see if he caught up with her, kept on pushing the close door button. Just as the doors were closing Johnny made it in at the last second, leaving the other three on the ground floor.

"That wasn't very nice." Johnny tutted her, as she backed up against the wall. "In fact, you've been very mean to me ever since we got back to New York. Calling me names in another language and hitting me" He smirked, and took another step closer to her; just as the elevator began to make its ascent up to the top floor that Reed, Nicole, and now Ben live on.

Nicole dodged his grabby hands and slammed herself into the other side of the elevator. "Well someone has to make sure you don't kill us all with your inflated ego. Also, I didn't call you names. I just said your inner child is showing." She stuck out her tongue at him and moved out of his reach when he tried to grab her again.

Unfortunately, with it being a small enclosed space, it didn't take Johnny long before he feinted to the left and caught Nicole in a vice-grip. Victoriously, he moved her into a corner of the elevator boxing her in between himself and the walls around them.

Breathing hard, Johnny smirked down at his prize who was struggling to get out of his grip, "Are you sure that's all there is to it? I know you like me, otherwise, you wouldn't have kissed me back."

"I do not. I'm just mean sometimes." Nicole huffed at him. She had to catch her breath from both the chase and her struggle against Johnny, "Just ask my friends back home." She trailed off when Johnny leaned his head closer to hers. Nicole felt a shiver go down her back, as he blew a puff of air on her ear.

Johnny laughed at her weak excuse. "I don't believe that. I just think you're a girl who likes to pick on her secret crush." He moved his head and was about to kiss Nicole when the elevator ding. Distracted by the doors opening, Nicole uses this opportunity to quickly jab Johnny's sides and the spot just under his armpit to make him let go.

With a grunt, Johnny lost his hold on the sneaky Asian who dashed out of the elevator. When he recovered, Johnny ran after her. Just as he was about to follow her around the corner another elevator ding and opened up for Reed and Susan.

With a snap of his fingers, Johnny swung around to face them. He made sure that none of his irritation showed on his face and smiled wide, greeting his sister and Reed. In his head though, he cursed them for interrupting his chase.

"Hey, where's the big guy?" he questions them.

"He, uh had to take the stairs. The elevator didn't support his weight." Answered Reed.

Johnny was silent for a second. "Well, that sucks." He nodded his head as if to agree with his own statement for Ben's situation.

"Where's Nicole?" Susan asks looking for the smaller woman.

"Here I am!" Nicole popped around the corner sliding her shoes against the floor. She held a banana in her hands and was peeling it. "Where's Ben?" Nicole took a bit out of the tip.

"The elevator didn't support his weight" Susan answered this time.

"Oh…." She took another bite out of the banana. Nicole ignored Johnny, who had walked over to stand next to her. She can practically feel the glare that he was shooting her and inwardly smirked. Susan raised an eyebrow at the look Johnny was shooting her.

Not noticing the tension between the two, Reed addressed them all while walking past them, "We should stay here until we can define the extent of our changes, and figure out how to reverse them." Susan, not wanting to be left behind, followed him.

Walking backward, Nicole followed after her and turned her head to Johnny. She smiled at him and made a **very** suggestive play with the banana in her mouth before taking a small bite out of it.

Johnny lost his glare and instead dropped his jaw. With a sensual look, she finished the banana and turned around. But not before giving him one last wink.

"Aw, fuck…" Johnny said to himself, quietly. His pants had tightened just a bit, enough to make it uncomfortable to be in.

Catching up to Susan, Nicole laughed to herself. _Oh, this is going to be fun._


	9. Dizzy Thoughts

**Disclaimer: I don't own the franchise. If I did, I would be rich.**

 _ **Italics**_ **= thoughts**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **This is self-beta.**

 **Chapter 8**

The next day started off with a bang. Or would it be a fire?

Reed started the trials off by testing Johnny's powers. Safe to say, that ended up with Johnny almost destroying them all in hell-fire.

Nicole whistle lowly. "Wow." She surveyed the damage caused by Johnny as she walked into the room. She didn't want to be in the same space as Susan and Reed. You could cut the sexual frustration with a knife. Upon reaching the destroyed container, she felt the ruined metal while ignoring the conversation between Johnny and the scientists.

The melted slag was hot to touch, but Nicole wasn't worried. This is just like another experiment, for you know, Science!

Concentrating, the blue ring around Nicole's eyes slowly envelope the entire iris, shifting it from her natural brown to luminescent blue. In a swirl of black mist, her shadows appeared. As it solidified, it wrapped around her arm as she absorbed the leftover energy.

Johnny, having finished his conversation with Reed noticed Nicole and her fixation on the metal. Observing the signs that she wasn't paying attention to her surroundings, Johnny decided to pay her back for leaving him in a…uh hum… hard situation.

With quick reflexes, Johnny yanked her wrist and pulled her down. "Ack!" He then started cackling like a hyena when she fell face-first in the foam.

"You jerk!" Nicole popped up and tried to hit him, but missed and fell back on the slippery foam. "Oof!"

"What's wrong? Can't take the heat?" Johnny scrapped some of the foam off his chest and flicked it at her face. It hit dead on with a wet splat.

"Aw, now you've done it." Nicole scooped up the foam and jumped him, smashing the foam in his face. "How you like them apples!"

"Children!" Both Johnny and Nicole froze in place only turning their heads to look at Susan who stood before them. With her hands on her hips, she tapped her foot on the ground like an angry mother. Reed stood next to her with a couple of towels in his hands.

"You might want to clean up," Reed said amused.

Nicole turned her head back at Johnny, then looked down when she felt something. A confused look came over her face before her cheeks turn bright red. "Oh my God!" She quickly got up on her feet almost tripping her way to Reed and taking the offered towel.

Nicole didn't have to turn back to see if Johnny had his stupid smirk on his face. It practically radiated off of him. She hid her blushing face in the towel unable to look anyone in the eyes.

"What's wrong Miss Blushy? Embarrassed?" Johnny got on his feet. Luckily, they were spared any graphics as the foam covered the private parts from being seen.

Susan sighed, yanking the extra towel from Reed and shoving it at Johnny. "Go shower, Johnny."

Wrapping the towel around his hips, he strutted to Nicole, "You wanna share? Looks like we both need a shower." Nicole looked up from her towel of shame and saw Johnny wagging his eyebrows. "Come on, I promised I'll spangle your stars." Nicole groaned at the overused joke.

"Are you ever going to drop that?"

"Nope."

"Then, no." She quickly made her getaway to her room

"Aww, come on!" Nicole sped up her pace eager to get away from him, but the youngest Storm was persistent and followed after her. Left behind, Reed and Susan watched their curious interaction.

"I bet you they'll either get together sometime soon, or it will be an all-out war between them," Susan said as she saw her brother chasing the other female.

Reed nodded his head to agree with her before doing a double take "Wait, wha-?"

Susan sighed again and walked away, "Men." she muttered under her breath. Reed was left standing there, confused.

* * *

After taking a quick shower minus the hot head, Nicole rejoined the scientists. Ben was the next up to be tested.

Handing a reflex hammer to Reed, Nicole stood behind Ben to take notes on the experiment. The first test sadly was a failure. Reed wasn't able to get a reaction from the rock-solid skin.

Stumped for a moment, Reed thought up another solution. Susan and Nicole watched as he ran out of the room, only to return with an actual hammer.

"Well, this is going to be good." Nicole mused to herself. Knowing how the patellar reflex work, she steered far away from Ben. She even managed to convince Susan to stay next to her, leaving Reed to do the manual work.

"CRASH!"

Wide-eyed, all four occupants stared at the ruin stool that landed on the second floor.

"Well, we know you could do demolition as a new job," Nicole said out loud. The others gave her an unamused look. "It's a thought!" she said to defend herself.

* * *

Susan was the next contestant in this round of experiments. Nicole sat her across from Reed while calibrating the machine they were going to use. Reed had a theory that he wanted to test.

Adjusting the looking piece so that it sat between Susan and Reed, Nicole started snickering. She was looking through the glass from Susan's end and saw Reed's head magnified from the other end. There was a booger up his nose. Grabbing a tissue, she gave it to Reed and gesture for him to clean himself.

Subject 3 test 1 was a go. Diligently, Nicole recorded the results of the first test on Susan. It took a little probing, but Susan was able to go invisible. It seemed Reed's theory was right. He was able to see that Susan had the ability to bend light around her, causing her to be invisible to the naked eye.

"Whoa!" Nicole looked up when she heard the exclamation to see Reed on the floor with papers scattered about. Looking at Susan, Nicole concluded that she was the cause for Reed predicament.

"You slip there Reed?" Nicole asked. Amusement bleeding into her voice.

"I'm fine." Reed groaned out.

Catching Susan's eye, Nicole saw the silent request for privacy. Stacking the notes she had taken, Nicole saved the results on the computer before handing them to Susan.

"So, I'm a little hungry. Want anything while I'm in the kitchen?" Nicole started walking away without waiting for a reply.

Just as she got halfway to the kitchen, a strong arm wrapped around her waist and swung her around while pulling her against them. Nicole would have shrieked in fright, but her mouth was covered, muffling the sound.

"Mmph!" The room darkened around her as the fluorescent lights flickered. Her shadow solidified and tried to pull more light from the surroundings.

Heart pounding and black mist swirling around her, Nicole turned her head to see the cause of her fright. "Mmnhny!" She started hitting any available space she could once she realized she wasn't in danger.

Johnny quickly released the hand on her mouth and spun her around to face him, not once did he let her go.

Once her mouth was freed, she voiced her anger, "Why do you always have to scare me! You can be such an ass, Storm! Now put me down!"

Feet dangling in the air, Nicole felt herself move as the cause of her anger laughed while holding her in his arms. "That was awesome, you're so easy to scare. I bet you're a screamer." He smirked her as he said this. "In fact why don't we-"

Nicole slapped her hand on his mouth before he could say any else. "I think you reached your quota of talking today."

Looking at her blue eyes, he shook his head. Nicole felt him smile into her hand before squealing loudly, as he spun her around real fast. She let go of his mouth and wrapped her arms around his neck as the room spun around her.

The swirling mass of darkness that enveloped the Asian disappeared when Nicole became too dizzy to focus on anything.

Johnny didn't stop spinning until he was sure she couldn't move without stumbling. Dropping her on her feet, Johnny let out an out of breath laugh as Nicole held on to him, gripping his t-shirt in a death grip.

With knees weak and equilibrium out of whack, all Nicole could do was speak, "Fuck you Storm. Y-you're an ass" She closed her eyes and thunk her head against his chest to steady herself. She felt him laugh again as he held onto her while he leaned against the wall. His balance was a little tipsy as well from the spin.

After a few moments of silence, Nicole opened her eyes now that she wasn't dizzy. "Why are there holes in your shirt?" She stared at the pink flesh that peaked out of the ruined shirt.

Johnny was silent at her question, "Oh, I forgot." He laughed. "I meant to go see the nerds before I saw you. It seems I'm burning off my clothes. Not that you mind, right?" Letting her go, he saluted her and walked off.

As he walked off, Nicole wondered how she missed the fact that his clothes were smoking. Walking into the kitchen, Nicole decided it was best not to question him. Knowing Johnny, he'll use it as an excuse to burn her clothes off.

* * *

Reed soon called a meeting for everyone in the living room. The topic of the even was 'suits'.

"Do we have to wear it? Can't you make something less skin tight?" Nicole looked down at herself. The dark blue suit was nice and all, but why did it have to form to their body shape? _I bet Doom only wanted to see Susan in the suit. The fucking pervert._

From the corner of her eye, she saw Johnny jogging down the stairs in the blue suit. Like everything else, he walked around like he owned it.

"I love these costumes! They're missing something though. Needs, like, spice-" Johnny said out loud. He started jabbing at the air.

"They're not costumes," Reed told him.

"You can't use your power in public, Johnny." Susan looked at her brother as he moved around in his suit.

"You guys are worse than NASA." Johnny scowled as he left the room.

"Are we going to start my testing now?" Nicole looked at the remaining scientists in the room from her spot on the couch. She had grown bored watching them lecture Johnny on being a good little boy. It was like they were already practicing for their future kids.

They turned to look at her before Reed nodded and directed her to the room he prepared for her.

Having cleared out the melted slag that was destroyed by Johnny, Reed set the room up with various things.

Standing in the middle of the floor, Nicole raised an eyebrow at the various things around her, from TVs, lamps, computers, lit candles, and even flaming torches. "What are we doing?" Like earlier, Nicole became fixated on the fire before her. Shaking her head, she turned away from the flames.

Instead, she watched as Reed and Susan reenter the control room they used when they tested Johnny. Even Ben came to watch her, though, he decided he rather lean over the railing than fit in a cramped space.

Through the intercom, Reed spoke to her, "We're going to test a couple of things we've noticed when you used your powers, Nicole." Unseen to her, Reed flipped a couple of switches and turned on the monitors. Flicking his eyes across the room, he saw that Nicole was waiting patiently for his signal.

Reed raised his hand in the air and Nicole tilted her head. She was confused as to what exactly she supposed to do. It was just a few seconds after Reed raised his hand that Nicole found out.

"Boo!"

"Ahh!" Nicole felt a couple of years disappear from her, as her powers began to manifest.

The shadowy mist they come to associate with Nicole's powers appeared around her before solidifying into thin tendrils reaching out from her shadow on the floor. The shadows, acting on her fear, shot out and snagged whatever it could to empower itself.

The electronics that Reed spread around her flickered on and off before exploding in a spray of sparks. The tendrils touching the lit candles and torches were immediately snuffed out as their flames were absorbed.

With a gasp, Nicole felt the immediate change to her eyes as energy filled her. The luminescent blue envelope her iris again, and not a speck of brown was left. Once all the power in the immediate area around her was gone, Nicole's shadows retreated back to circled her form; ready to strike at a moment's notice.

"That. Was. Awesome! Did you see that?" An irritating familiar voice sounded from the doorway out of the room. There, with a smug smirk on his lips was Johnny in all of his glory, holding a mic in his hand.

Glaring at him, Nicole traced the mic in his hand and the speaker that was suspiciously staged behind her at full blast.

"You Jerks! I can't believe you staged this." Nicole crossed her arms scowled at all of them. Johnny and Ben were too busy laughing to pay attention to her.

Huffing, Nicole looked down and saw her shadow responding to her emotions. Giving the laughing hyenas another look, a wicked thought formed in her head. Using the stored energy she absorbed, Nicole formed two tendrils and had them slither on the ground towards her targets.

The shadows came upon its victims unnoticed, and with a mighty tug, it sent them sprawling on the floor. With a satisfied smirk, Nicole laughed as Ben fell off the second-floor observatory on his rocky side with a mighty thud. She knew he wasn't harmed, so she felt free to laugh at him. Now Johnny, she merely made him fall on his ass.

For him, revenge is a dish best served cold.

"Hey now, playtime is over. We still have to test Nicole's absorption capability." Reed's voice was heard on the intercom. "You're up Johnny. Clear the area first."

Grumbling, all three minions followed his orders and moved everything out of the way. Once the area was clear, Ben lumbered back to his spot to watch the events, leaving Johnny and Nicole in the middle of the room.

Facing each other, they waited for Reed's go-ahead to proceed.

"Alright, Johnny go ahead and start this. Start small though, no supernova this time."

With a wide grin, Johnny set his whole self on fire. Apparently, this was his version of small.

Crossing his arms, Johnny smirked at Nicole, "Is it getting hot in here or is it just me?"

Nicole gave him an unimpressed look. Holding her hand out to him, Nicole let her shadow cloak her arm.

"Tough crowd." Johnny reached out and grabbed her hand in his. Fascinated, he watched and felt how Nicole absorbed his energy. Thinking how slow things were going, Johnny upped the ante. He started raising his temperature at a steady pace just to see how much she can take.

Seeing the look on his face, Nicole frowned at him. She had to call up more shadows just to keep up with him. Eventually, her whole body was soon covered in them. For every ounce of power Johnny released, Nicole was there to take it in.

Meanwhile, in the observatory, Reed and Susan observing their readings.

"It's amazing. It's like she has a never-ending capacity to absorb energy. At the same time, she converts it for her own use." Reed said as he looked on in awe.

And just as he said that more shadows appeared around the two youngest members, swirling around them in a black vortex.

Entranced by the display around him, Johnny wanted to see how far she could go. Stepping forward, he wrapped his arms around Nicole and raised his temperature near supernova. His earlier conversation with the scientists forgotten.

The energy she absorbed from him was incredible. She couldn't even begin to describe how it felt. If she had to put it into words, it was like a never-ending hot bath that got hotter and hotter till you drown in it. Already, she was drunk in his very essence as it spread through her body.

For Johnny, it was a little bit different. To him, it felt like the craziest adrenaline rush he has ever felt. Or more aptly, it was like the runner's high. The feeling of euphoria that fills your being after a long period of running. It only made him itch for more, as he let loose another burst of power.

Letting out a small breath, Nicole felt her shadows closed in on them. Like her, they were very much attracted to the fiery energy Johnny put out. Similar to a soft embrace, her tendrils wrapped around them. Blazing blue eyes gaze up into burning white as they ignored the world around them.

"Johnny, what are you doing?!" Susan yanks the mike and yelled through the intercom. For having rocky features, Ben was looking pretty nervous; and Reed, well he was distracted by his readings before realizing what was happening.

"Nicole! Snap out of it!" Reed shouted.

And with that, the moment was gone. Realizing the danger they were in, Nicole snapped her shadows and quickly enclosed Johnny and herself into a dome. No more flames escaped the inky darkness as both figures disappeared from view.

Inside the dome, it was a sight to see as flames crawled up the walls before disappearing into the darkness. As seconds rolled by, the fire died down and it got harder for both of them to breathe. "Johnny, stop."

Instead of listening, he leaned down and kissed her while burning up the last of the oxygen. With no oxygen left, Johnny lost his ability to produce fire plunging them into darkness. It didn't seem to faze him though. Instead, he continued to kiss Nicole until they were both breathless and on the edge of consciousness.

With one last lingering touch of the lips, Johnny released her from his kiss. Once freed, Nicole did the only thing possible.

She passed out.

And Johnny followed her.

With both parties knocked out, the dome phased out of existence in a mass of black swirls. As the mist left, it revealed their unmoving-embraced forms on the floor.

"Wow." uttered Ben.

Susan flew out of the observatory and ran to their sides. Checking their pulses, she leaned back and sighed in relief.

"They're okay. Just passed out."

Stretching his legs, Reed was there in two steps. "We're lucky Nicole was quick to act. It's incredible how much power they both have." All three stared at their companions in silence as they contemplated what happened.

Unknown to them, another person was watching the events that took place.

"Incredible indeed." Victor Doom said as he watched through his monitor. Greedy eyes surveyed the fallen figures before it lingered on the blonde female. With a contempt look at Reed, he shut off the device.


	10. First of Many

**Disclaimer: This is FanFiction! I own no rights to anything of Marvel or Fox.**

 **This is self-beta'd**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 _Italics_ **\- thoughts**

 **A/N: Johnny may seem a little out of character. I tried to base my interpretation of him with a combination of his comic book self and his movie character. It's a blend of overall hotness.** **Johnny Storm, while hot-headed and girl crazy, is very much into finding true love, but it doesn't always work for him. His comic character's love life isn't all that great and the same thing for his movie character. I just think he's sort of like Chris Evans who wants to find his Disney Princess. Just more dirty minded. But anyway, I'm between classes until Spring. So, expect more updates from me. Just don't expect them to be that fast.**

 **It took me a long time to write this. I had to revise this so many times that it frustrated me so much that I couldn't move on. So to apologize to you all I thought it would be better if I made it longer to make up for lost time. So here is your Christmas gift! If you don't follow Christmas than happy whatever holiday you follow.**

 **Warning: Fluff alert! I tried to get more characterization in and added a scene with a little mature content at the end.**

 **Chapter 9**

"I can't believe you two!" Johnny and Nicole flinched at the shrill yell. Both of the youngest members on the top floor of the Baxter building reluctantly sat on the couch while enduring the angry blonde's verbal assault. It didn't help at all with the small headache they received from fainting in their dome of fire and shadow. Luckily, they were only knocked out for a couple of minutes preventing any serious injuries besides bruised heads.

"We even talked about this right before you started Johnny! You could've killed us all! And Nicole! I expected better of you. If you could have stopped him sooner, why didn't you?" Susan began to angry walk circles in front of them as everyone sans Ben watched her. Ben knew better than to get between an angry Susan and her prey.

The guilty party, (Johnny and Nicole) simply thought it was best to let her rant until she ran out of steam.

Making sure she looked suitably repentant, Nicole balanced a small ice pack on her head and closed her eyes. She almost sighed in relief from the refreshing coolness, "Sorry." Nicole said half-heartedly. It would have been more believable, unfortunately, it was hard to be sincere when you were forced to apologize over and over again.

Blanking out, Nicole ignored the rest of the ranting by gazing away from everyone. It was dark outside.

 _Oh, I forgot to call Scotty. I'll call him later._ Nicole mused as she thought about her friend about that favor she needed. Best to wait until the yelling stop. Whatever Susan said afterward went straight out the other ear, as she reiterated her whole speech. Honestly, she got it the first time after the first 30 minutes into the reprimand. Everything Susan said afterward was just being repeated in several different and creative ways.

Though thinking about it, Susan must have developed this cruel technique to punish Johnny. And like a light bulb that was lit, Nicole's face brightened up at her sudden revelation. The short Asian focused her amazed and now interested stare at the blonde and noticed for the first time that she was entirely focused on Johnny during her speech. If she did this right, she can slip through this and let Johnny fend for himself.

Inwardly cackling, Nicole had to time it right. She can't let anything distract her, not even the giant furnace sitting right next to her. Maybe after her escape, she can think about what happened during the exploration of her powers, but for now, IGNORE, IGNORE IGNORE.

"We're still here, aren't we?" The annoyed Johnny slouched into the couch and rested his feet on the table. Leaning his head back, Johnny draped his icepack on his face. Small wisps of steam flowed up from the pack, "It's not like we even destroyed the building." The second half of his retort was muffled by the ice pack.

"Johnny!" Susan hissed at him. She had been at this for over an hour and nothing seemed to get through. Stomping closer to her brother, Susan looked like she was just about ready to go through another hour of yelling.

Seeing her chance, Nicole knew that this was her chance to run.

Unfortunately, the Great Suzy Escape was halted when Reed step in, "What Susan means is that we appreciated it if the both of you would have been more responsible. We're lucky nothing else went wrong." here he sighed, "Why don't you guys call it quits for today. It's been an eventful few weeks. There's still a lot of data I have to go through before I can come up with a solution."

Disgruntled, Nicole looked up at him. Just as she was about to make a break for it, Reed decided to save them all nonchalantly. Reed always ruined her fun, first the hover car, then letting Ben win, and now this. Making sure that her grumpiness didn't leak out Nicole smiled as she asked, "You need any help?" As the resident assistant, she was still obligated to do her job.

Reed waved her off, "Nah, I can do it. It'll be faster if I went through everything."

That was a-okay with Nicole. Less work for her to do. Not that she let it show on her face. She's a professional Asian, for gosh shakes. There's a reputation to be upheld. No need to let on that she loves being lazy.

The group dispersed as they said their goodnights before Susan and Reed retired, one to a relaxing bath and the other back to the lab. That left the two troublemakers by themselves. And Ben, nowhere to be seen. Though, the snores coming from down the hall was a big hint.

"So…" Johnny let the ice pack fall from his face as he raised his head and gave a sexy smirk towards Nicole, "Wanna finish off where we left off? Minus the fire of course. Unless you want me to burn off your clothes for you."

His eyes flashed white at her and Nicole's own blue eyes glowed back at him. The blue has yet to fade from view. With no place to go, her powers stayed beneath the surface waiting to be used. While keeping eye contact with Nicole, Johnny scooted closer to her until he was practically over the smaller woman. Laying his left arm on the back of the couch and the other on her knee, Johnny let his body language do the talking for him.

Feeling hot at the close contact, Nicole's voice hitched at the back of her throat as the rest of her body responded quickly to his close proximity. Her eyes traveled south to his lips before she broke eye contact with his smoldering gaze. No matter how much she wanted to submit to him, she knew she had to stop this. Even though she _really_ wanted to let him take her right then and there. But that would just end badly for the both of them if they jumped head first into this.

With a thought, her eyes shined brightly as one of her shadows manifested before pushing him firmly away from her. Johnny allowed the movement, but he hungrily watched her as he wet his lower lip. It didn't escape his notice the way she looked at him. Seeing his hungry look, Nicole eyed him back stubbornly. She won't let him distract her! Luckily, she was able to speak without stuttering, "Johnny," she paused as she gathered her thoughts. "Why are you… so pushy about this?" Nicole waved her hand at both of them as she said this. "I don't want to be some side chick if this is just about sex. As… great, it would be to have sex with you, I don't want this to be a 'wham, bam, thank you ma'am' kind of situation, okay? If it is, I want you to stop. I don't want to be played with." Abruptly, she stood up from her seated position in order to think clearly without his influence.

Silently, Johnny sat there frozen after she spoke. His posture straightens from his predatory crouch and his face went blank as he stared at her. Nicole waited for his reply, but he didn't give her one. All he did was give her an intense burning look without saying anything to her.

For the past few weeks she'd known him, Johnny was always the loudmouth with an ever-changing expression on his face. He's also one of the biggest perverts she ever met in all of her 23 years of life. If he didn't have a cocky grin on his face it would always be a lecherous look and grab towards her. Not that it bothered her. She liked him looking at her, even if she found it too intense and very uncomfortable at times. The fact of the matter is that Johnny is never serious. He wouldn't be Johnny if he was. That's why it made her so unnerved to see him this way.

As time ticked by with no reply, Nicole rubbed her face before sighing. With a light toss, her ice pack landed on the coffee table. "I guess that answers that question." With her head held high, she didn't bother to give him a backward glance as she left the room. She may have looked strong on the outside, but on the inside, Nicole felt like someone was squeezing her heart and her eyes burn.

Taking a deep breath, Nicole walked back to her room with an air of sadness. She had a small hope that maybe something could have happened between the two of them, only to be disappointed in the end and maybe a little heartbroken. Nicole didn't have a lot of dating experience under her belt. Most of her experience consisted of one high school boyfriend who was really more of a friend with an overly attached family and a couple of one-night stands. Nothing long lasting there. Maybe a nighttime snack run will help her feel better.

So lost in thought, Nicole didn't hear the quick footsteps behind her as she unlocked the door to her room. Entering, she turned back to close the door and realized with a shock that Johnny stood at the threshold.

"!" Nicole covered her mouth with a hand to stop herself from screaming. This time no appliances were broken.

She was pushed back into the room as Johnny moved in while shutting the door behind him. With no small amount of trepidation, Nicole waited to see what he had to say.

"I-" he stopped short. Johnny closed his eyes and breathed in deeply to gather his thoughts. Opening his eyes, he gave her another intense look. "I'm not using you. I mean yeah, I kissed you. Well, I kissed you a lot. And grope you…. and almost had you naked for me." Here, he blinked a couple of times at the words he had just spouted. "You know what, I'm surprised you didn't call the cops on me." he joked.

Nicole bit the inside of her cheek at his attempt of a joke. But what he did say was a cause for concern though. She didn't normally react this way towards guys. She would have already used her knife or pulled her gun on them by now for taking liberties with her person.

She watched as Johnny's posture loosened and in a soft grip, he pulled her towards him. Nicole had to crane her head up to look at him and saw his Adam's apple bobbed. "How 'bout you let me take you on a date. Kissing you…. I honestly never felt anything like it before. No one ever made me feel like this."

Leaning down, Johnny lightly kissed Nicole on the lips. The kiss was so sweet and the warmth radiating him made Nicole feel like she was lighter than air. Closing her eyes, Nicole leaned into his embraced and Johnny tangled a hand in her hair. He lingered for a moment more before finally resting his forehead against hers. "You can't tell me you didn't feel anything in that kiss."

Nicole's lips trembled and her throat felt dry. He was right, as much as she wanted to she couldn't deny it.

"I do feel… something." She shivered as Johnny ran his hands up and down her sides, as he gazed into her eyes. "The kisses… they're-"

"Magical?" Johnny said as he gave her a sexy smirk and his eyes darted down to her lips.

Nicole huffed at his interruption but didn't refute it.

"If you really are serious about this… then we're doing this my way." She jerked Johnny's hands down. They have been slowly creeping up to graze underneath her breasts.

Stepping away from him, Nicole crossed her arms once she was out of touching distance. "1. We are not having sex." The look Johnny gave her was a cross between horrified and scandalized. It made her want to stop and laugh at him, but no, she had to be firm. "2. I expect to be taken on dates. It doesn't always have to be fancy, we could even walk in the park for all I care. And 3. No side chicks, got it? You cheat on me, I will end this, preferably with that gun under my pillow. If you can follow that, maybe, just maybe I'll let go of the first rule."

Johnny didn't know whether to be ecstatic at the news or horrified at the stipulations. Especially with the revelation that the tiny Asian before him had a gun. A GUN. To further prove her point, Nicole walked to her bed and pulled her Ruger LC9S from its hiding place and racked a bullet. Johnny didn't know whether to be scared or turned on by how tantalizing she looked. He did find it hot that she knew her way around a firearm. Seeing that her message was received, Nicole took out her magazine and cleared the chamber. Once she set the gun down Johnny gave her a wide grin before dragging her into a kiss that almost took her breath away.

Leaning back from the kiss Johnny said, "You won't regret it, Nicole. By the way, that was really hot. You should let me see you shoot sometime. Maybe a little one-on-one lesson between us." before he gave her another kiss. This kiss though was more passionate than the other ones he had given her. It felt like a promise _to_ _us_.

As she was beginning to get lost in the feeling, she felt a hand creep up to undo the zipper to her suit. Slapping it down, Nicole released the kiss and glared at Johnny.

"Well, can't blame a guy for trying." He shrugged at her. Johnny gave her another peck on the lips before squeezing her ass and hightailing out the door.

Nicole blew a stray hair from her face, unable to believe that she gave in to him. _I really hope I won't regret this._ Nicole turned back to her pistol and returned the unused bullet back into her magazine before storing it in its proper place. _Oh, gotta call Scotty. I'm sure I can get Susan's codes._ Nicole plotted as she called her friend about a virus.

* * *

Life at the Baxter building went back to normal routine as the scientists went back to puzzling over the results of the tests. The only differences seen were that where ever Nicole was, Johnny was not far behind. Not that the others noticed it, they were too busy trying to get back to normal. In fact, over the next couple of days, Nicole found little notes in the most curious of places when she was assisting Reed and Susan with their work. The notes would appear only when no one was looking and for her eyes only. She didn't know how, but Johnny always manage to sneak in and put it somewhere she could see it. She would walk away from her workspace for a moment only to come back to see a little surprise waiting for her.

It ranged from little Hershey kisses to small notes that always complimented her. The notes though were the real kicker. She loved finding them, but of course, this is Johnny we're talking about. Some of them were sweet and thoughtful while others were just down-right sinful to read. The first naughty note she found had her blushing from head to toe. She was so embarrassed that Reed had honestly thought she was coming down with a negative reaction from her mutation. She almost had to fight him off with a stick to keep him from doing any more unnecessary blood tests. She had a little trouble thinking up an excuse for why she was so red.

After that embarrassment, Nicole excused herself to get a breather only to be intercepted. No guesses necessary to realize who was waiting for her. Safe to say, Nicole did not get that breather she wanted. Or any other times when she took a break from work.

Every chance he got, Johnny would pull her into a nearby room or around the corner to make out with her. It happened so often that she learned to go along with it and returned his kisses with much enthusiasm. Their make-out sessions would leave her wanting for more, especially the ones where he took special care to work her up. It seemed like he was trying his hardest to get her to let up on her first rule.

If she happened to return with her long hair a little messy since then, no one spoke of it. Though, Susan did give her a raised eyebrow when she happened to notice Johnny's attention towards her. It eventually leads to a conversation Nicole did not want repeating. EVER. (Ben was right, she can be scary.) Luckily, Susan did like her and wasn't as harsh as she could have been.

* * *

The next morning arrived a little brighter for everyone. Waking up, Nicole was greeted to the sight of an origami rose on her pillow next to her. Blinking, she picked it up and read the stem,

'Good morning, Miss Blussy. –J'

Fighting a smile, Nicole traced the edges of it but then paused. She stared hard at the paper flower before realizing something. That fucker broke into her room! Her eyes darted across the room to her door and lo and behold, the door was unlocked with another note.

Getting off her bed she strode towards the door and ripped off the note.

'You really think a door can keep me from you? Think again, babe. –J'

With an eye twitching, Nicole couldn't decide whether to slug him for his audacity or get hot and bothered at his insinuation. She could practically feel the smirk he wore as he wrote it. With a huff, Nicole decided to let it go for now. She got dressed for the day and shoved the flower and note into her art desk drawer where she keeps all the other notes he gave her.

Before walking away she did see something of interest that caught her attention. Right there in a bin, was a tub of pink and purple glitter. A smirk appeared on her face as she set aside the ingredient to Johnny's misery. The half plan she already thought up was reforming into a better plan.

Mission in mind, Nicole marched out of her room with a purpose. But first, breakfast. She needed food and walked into the kitchen. Once there, she realized she was the first one there. _Dang, it._ Sighing, she started breakfast.

It was long established between the three of them: Ben, Nicole, and Reed, that whoever was first in the kitchen had to cook breakfast. Going into the fridge, she pulled out the bowl of fruit she had made the day prior, eggs, bacon, and milk.

Setting that out on the counter, she peered into her rice cooker to see if there was any more rice left. Nicole cheered as she saw enough for her breakfast.

Taking out a bunch of eggs, she cracked them into two bowls. One significantly bigger than the other. In the bigger bowl, she made a mix of regular scrambled eggs with salt, pepper, and milk to make it fluffy. In the smaller one, instead of milk, she added a dash of Golden Mountain seasoning sauce, salt, pepper and a couple of diced tomatoes. Grabbing two frying pans, she set them on the stove to heat up.

Just as she began to mix the eggs, Nicole felt a kiss on her cheeks. Turning her head, she sees Johnny leaning against the counter watching her.

Raising an eyebrow at him, she continued to whisk the eggs as she watched him. His smile widened at her attention.

"Soooo, I got us tickets." Blinking in surprised, Nicole stopped whisking.

"To where?" She looked at him suspiciously.

Reaching into his back pocket, Johnny slides a folded piece of paper to her. "I expect kisses as payment." Folding his arms, he waited for her to squeal.

Wary, Nicole unfolded the piece of paper. Hopefully, it wouldn't be some cheesy Rom-Com. A shocked gasp escaped her lips as she read it.

"You got Sweeney Todd tickets?" She said to him with a shocked look.

The smug grin Johnny gave her was her reply. "I saw your little list of things to do on your corkboard." Resting his hands on her hips he looked down at her, "Well? Where's my kiss, Blussy?"

Folding up the paper, Nicole looked at him and his self-satisfied smirk. Even with his smug grin, she couldn't help, but find it a little charming. "Fine, one kiss." Nicole placed the paper back into his pocket and Johnny leaned down for her and closed his eyes for his reward.

Smirking at him, Nicole leaned stood up on her tiptoes and gave him a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth before twirling out of his grasp. With a skip, she returned to the eggs she prepared and oiled the pans. Taking both bowls of eggs she poured the batches to cook. With a quick peek, Nicole laughed as she took in Johnny's dumbfounded look.

"There's your kiss. Now shoo, I'm cooking." No sooner did she said that the rest of the crew walked in.

"Tha' eggs?" Ben's gravelly voice asked her. There was a rummaging to her right as Ben reached over to grab the bag of oranges and a glass bowl.

"Yup. You want bacon with them?" Nicole asked, ignoring Johnny who gave her a sad wounded look at being denied his treat. She likened him to a little Golden Labrador puppy. But unfortunately for him, she babysat too many kids and became immune to the look.

Ben scoffed, "I don't even know why ya ask."

"Okie Dokie, smokie." He grunted in reply, well used to her quirkiness.

Johnny sat down heavily in his seat as he watches his Asian tormentor cook. Ben gave him a look as Reed and Susan sat down. "What's wrong with chu?"

"Nothin'" Johnny replied grumpily. Out of everyone's sight, Nicole gave him a wicked smile and stuck her tongue at him. _Oh, just you wait._ He thought furiously, plotting different ways to get his well-deserved reward.

With the eggs finished, Nicole poured the bigger batch on a serving plate for everyone else on the table before grabbing her plate for her eggs. She left the second pan in the sink to be cleaned and used the first one to fry the bacon. Soon, the scent of cooked pork filled the room.

In no time at all the bacon was finished and excess grease was wiped off before being served. Grabbing a serving of rice, and a few pieces of bacon, Nicole sat down to eat with everyone.

There was small talk around the table and everyone thanked her for the meal as they broke their fast. Just as she took her first bite Nicole heard a weird sound. Looking to her left, she saw a bunch of oranges' vital juices being squeezed to death into a bowl by Ben. She vaguely wondered if it was sanitary to steal a glass from him.

Apparently, Johnny thought so as he got up from the table and stole the finished product from Ben to pour himself a glass at the counter.

"All right, I'm here. We ate breakfast." Nicole looked at Johnny's plate to see it was picked clean. "Let's make this quick. I got places to go today." He rolled his eyes, "Oh wait. I don't go anywhere."

Nicole gave him a confused look. She clearly remembered the date on the tickets was for today. Why was Johnny lying?

If she hadn't been looking straight at him, she would have missed the quick wink that Johnny sent her as he turned to look at Reed.

"Johnny, it's imperative that we stay inside for the foreseeable future." Reed tried to reason with him.

 _Oh, I see._ Nicole mused. It seems that Johnny planned to sneak them both out tonight for their date.

Finishing her breakfast, Nicole glanced around to see where the fruit bowl was and saw it next to Ben. _Don't laugh_. Though it was a little sad to see him struggle to pick up a fork, so she grabbed it for him before taking the bowl herself.

Ben straighten up and growled at her for taking the bowl. It was the second time today that a bowl was stolen from him. Rolling her eyes, she slid some of the fruit onto her plate before giving it back to him.

"I know, I know Reed, but when you said that last time, my brain hurt for a week."

Nicole watched the proceedings as she popped a piece of fruit in her mouth. Across from her, Susan spoke up.

"It's still too dangerous for either of you to be in public." She pointed at Johnny and Nicole with her fork. Nicole wanted to look offended, but she could see where Susan was coming from.

Out of all of them, Johnny and she seem to have the most widespread destructive powers out of the 'Fantastic Five'.

"You've been saying that for years." Johnny retorted as he turned around. He gave her a look that all siblings recognized. Aggravation.

"I know you're worried, but we do have control over what we do. Well… maybe not Johnny, he's still burning clothes." Nicole pointed to Johnny who merely made a comment that he'll burn anything off for her. In retaliation, Nicole snatched his glass of orange juice and took a drink from it.

Setting down his fork, Reed looked to everyone. "What worries me is that our powers are evolving."

An excited look came to Johnny. "I know, I know! I am so close to flying guys, I can taste it." He reached over and swiped back his glass from Nicole.

Looking down and flexing her empty hand, Nicole replied, "Falling."

"Flying." With narrow eyes, Johnny challenged her back as he took another sip of orange juice.

"So. What's going on? How you gonna cure us?" Ben asked while he glared at the OJ snatchers.

"I'm gonna build a machine to recreate the storm. The cosmic rays will travel from this generator to this chamber." Reed told them, as he pulled out his handy dandy notebook. Complete with ready-made pictograms of his design.

Johnny wondered when he had time to do make that. "What, no pop-ups?"

"Yeah, where's that neat hologram you had for Douche face?" Nicole said. Ignoring them, Reed continued with his presentation.

"If I can reverse the wave signal-"

Catching on, Ben finished his sentence with hope in his eyes, "It'll return us back to normal."

"But what are the risks?" Susan asked as she played devil's advocate while looking through the notes.

A serious look overtook Reed's face. "Even a small miscalculation could increase our symptoms exponentially. Or, perhaps kill us."

"Now, dying –that's bad, right?" Johnny asked half-jokingly and half-afraid. His hand that was resting on the back of Nicole's chair tightened of the thought.

"Nope. I'm not going in that thing. If you guys want to, I'm not stopping you. Nuh-uh." Nicole got out of her chair to put away her plates, which Johnny took and sat in it backward.

Johnny seconded her, "I agree with her, we just let sleeping dogs lie, guys. I like living and all it comes with it."

Putting down his chewed on utensil, Ben demanded how long it would be ready. The conversation almost boiled down to an argument when Reed couldn't give him an answer. Susan, fed up with the shouting, told everyone to get along.

Nicole merely watched the squabble from the sidelines wondering how this all happened. _All I wanted was to go to space._

* * *

Knock, Knock!

Nicole looked at her bedroom door as it swung open from her spot on the bed. A PlayStation 2 controller in her hands and Kingdom Hearts 2 on her TV.

"Did you just lock-pick my door? Again?" She scowled at Johnny as he snuck in.

Johnny waggled his eyebrows at her. "It's not that hard. I can show you later if you want to return the favor." He locked the door before flopping on the bed next to her. Licking his lips, he eyed the red blouse and skinny jeans she was wearing, "You ready for our date Ms. Blussy?"

Rolling her eyes, Nicole went back to her game. "Of course I'm ready Hot Head. You still haven't explained how we're going to escape our wardens." A firaga was shouted from the screen.

"Oh, ye of little faith. Don't worry about it. I'm sure they won't even notice." Stretching out, Johnny leaned on his left elbow and placed his right hand on the small of Nicole's back. She didn't even twitch as she continued to fight Sephiroth.

When she showed no reaction to his touch, he smiled and slipped his hand under her shirt.

"Johnny, if you unhook my bra again, I'm going to slap you out of this room."

He laughed, "I'm just touching. You said no sex, but nothing about touching." He moved closer until his mouth was against her ear. "So, second base? Or should we just skip to third?"

"What are we? High-schoolers?" Nicole scoffed but made no move to remove his hand.

Taking that as permission, Johnny lazily ran his hand across her smooth back and traced patterns into her skin. Upon reaching a bump in the skin, he lifted up her shirt a bit to get a closer look.

"Where did you get this?" as he traced the small scar on her lower back before resuming his exploration.

"Hm?" Nicole said. "Oh that. I was playing hide and seek when I was seven. Went under a bed that had a spring and it caught me. Didn't even feel it."

Johnny hummed at her response and started to massage her back. For the next few minutes Johnny's hands rubbed the skin on her back and a wave of pleasure fell over her. Nicole felt her eyes change color as the heat from his hands seeped into the areas he touched. Unable to continue her game, she went to a save point and turned everything off while turning onto her back. In doing so, Johnny's hands now rested on her stomach.

A contented sigh escaped from her as she soaked in the energy. Closing her eyes, Nicole moaned a little as Johnny raised the heat in his hands on her stomach. If she had been normal, the searing heat would surely have burned, but to her it was soothing. So soothing in fact she was beginning to feel a little….

"We should have sex…. On fire."

Nicole groaned and rolled away in disappointment at the ruined moment, "Why do you always think with your dick?"

"No, no, no, no. Hear me out." Johnny rolled her backside and held his hand to cup her face to make her look at him. Using his powers, he transferred more energy to her as he stared into her luminescent blue eyes with his eyes flashing white. With his other arm, he tugs her over until she laid on top of him as he spoke. "I know you feel the same way I do when we're together. It's a fuckin' rush. Imagine if we're having sex while we're doing that." Johnny had such a proud look on his face when he voiced his thoughts. Nothing could dissuade him from the idea, in fact, he got a goofy grin on his face as he thought about it and dropped his hands to her hips.

An audible thud hit his chest. Nicole felt like doing a facepalm and choked down a laugh, "Oh my gosh, I can't believe you said that."

"Hey! I'm not the only one who thought that. I know you're thinking it too." In retaliation, he started poking her in the sides.

A shriek of laughter erupted out of Nicole as she rolled off of him. Or tried too. "Nuh uh, you can't escape from me! Who's laughing now?!" He cried out triumphantly. Fingers wiggling up her sides.

For a brief moment, Nicole broke free and she was almost to the edge of the bed before she was mercilessly dragged back to her tormentor. Straddling her waist, Johnny continued to tickle her into submission until her laughter was soundless.

Taking that as a win, Johnny relented his assault. He smiled widely as Nicole laid limply on the bed while taking huge gulps of air. "You're an ass." She weakly glared at him.

"Ahh name calling. You seem to like doing that, but I'll take that any day if I get to hear you laugh." Leaning down, Johnny gave her a kiss before getting off her bed. Once on his feet, he grabbed Nicole's ankle and pulled her to the edge closest to the door.

"Come on Blussy, we can get something quick to eat before the show." Taking her hand, Johnny helped her up to her feet and shooed her over to her shoes.

Nicole huffed at him before doing as he pleased. Once her shoes were on, they were off. But not before Johnny nabbed a red DC Flash cap off her hook.

* * *

It seems like their prep work wasn't needed after all. They didn't even have to sneak down the stairs. Everyone on their floor was so busy, that they didn't even notice the wayward troublemakers.

"I didn't realize you meant this as a quick bite to eat." Nicole mused while she waited beside Johnny at a hotdog cart. With her Flash cap on backward, Johnny paid for their meal.

"Of course! It's fast and easy. And we won't even be late for the show. Besides Antonio's Hotdogs are Fantastic. Thanks, man." He flashed her a grin and wagged his eyebrows as they were given their hotdogs.

"You're lucky I'm not a picky eater." Nicole couldn't help but smile at his pun before taking a bite out of her hotdog.

Johnny snorted when he heard her, "I knew that already. I've seen you eat a bowl of cereal and pizza in one sitting before having meatloaf an hour later."

"I love food." She told him seriously and took another bite.

Johnny barked out another laugh at her. "To food!" he toasted his hot dog at her and Nicole toasted him back.

"Yum."

* * *

"Hey, what's this0 about?" Johnny whispered to her as the lights turned off. He had gotten them the best tickets he could on short notice. In fact, he managed to sweet talk the ticket girl on the phone to get box seats for their enjoyment. The perks of being the new superhero.

"I have no clue." Was her deadpan answer. Nicole leaned over the balcony as a screen was lowered to help the audience view the actors more closely.

Johnny looked at her incredulously, "Then why are we here? Why was it on your board?"

"I just wanted to see a Broadway production. I just picked it because my friend told me she saw it before and like it. Why, do you know what happens?" Nicole sat up and asked him curiously.

"No, I thought you did. That's why I bought these tickets for you." He was still in disbelief at her overall attitude.

"Oh well, thank you for being so thoughtful." Nicole kissed him sweetly on the lips before turning to watch the opening scene. Johnny grumbled to himself as he settled down in his seat for the next couple of hours. _Great._

 **Three Hours Later**

"You know, I thought that was going to suck, but that was actually pretty good." Johnny was impressed with the blood show.

"I wonder what happened to Joanna after everything." Nicole mused. They walked out of the theatre satisfied with the viewing. The streetlights were on and the night sky greeted them as cars rushed by.

Wrapping an arm around her, Johnny answered her question. "Maybe she ran off with the kid and the guy. Who knows? It was a good show though."

Both of them weren't in a rush to get back home, so they settled to walk around enjoying each other's company. "Thank you, Johnny. I'm glad you took me out." Nicole said with a happy smile on her face.

Stopping them both at a corner street, Johnny turned her to face him. Resting his hands on her hips, Johnny's cocky grin was back, "Uh huh. Now, where's my reward?"

"I already gave you, your reward. Mr. Greedy." Nicole slipped out of his grip and turned back to the direction of the car.

Until she was stopped and yanked right back into Johnny's arms, "It's kind of hard not to be greedy with you being such a selfish minx." He raised an eyebrow down at the teasing shorty.

"I can stop if you want." Unperturbed, Nicole watched for his reaction.

"I didn't say that! I like it. You're like a sexy librarian or, or a nerdy Asian." He grinned down at the woman in his arms. As he said that, Nicole couldn't help but notice a certain gleam in his eyes.

Nicole nodded her head as she gave him a long look, "Hmmm." In fact, that long look made his grin falter. "Uh, huh. Hmm… Johnny, did you had a crush on the Yellow Power Ranger as a kid?"

Johnny froze at her question. For the first time in her life since knowing him, Nicole saw him do something that amazed her.

Johnny was blushing!

"You did have a crush on her!" Nicole crowed in victory at him. Johnny covered his flaming face, wishing that the ground would swallow him, as Nicole continued her teasing. "That's why you've been trying so hard. Johnny has an Asian fetish! Did you have a crush on Lucy Liu too?!" She giggled hysterically as he tried to shush her, but all that happened was him getting more embarrassed.

"Alright, alright." Johnny lowered his hand as he tried to control his blushing. "I, Johnny Storm, do have an Asian fetish." He said this like he was in an AA meeting. Nicole laughed harder at his confession. "And I know just who can fix it." Johnny grinned as he caught the unsuspecting woman in a long kiss.

Once they came back up for air did Nicole reply to him, "You know, you can't just keep on kissing me to change the subject."

"But it works so well." He smirked at her while leading her back to his car.

She didn't dispute him as he wrapped his arm back around her waist.

"Hey, Johnny?"

"Yup?"

"Get your hand off my ass." His arm slid back up to the small of her back.

Johnny laughed, "You didn't have a problem with me touching you earlier." He pulled back his arm and slapped her ass. "And I think you like it too much when I do this." This got him a return smack on the ass with her tendril. Johnny jumped a bit at the unexpected hit, but he growled playfully at her as she laughed at him before she ran back to the car.

This obviously prompted Johnny to run after her. Regrettably, for the running Asian, Johnny had one big advantage against her. He had long legs and could run. Her? Well, there's a reason why she got out of the military. Poor Nicole was eventually caught when her right foot spasm, causing her to automatically slow down. With a grimace, she stopped as the other foot started hurting as well. Sometimes she cursed the military for the damage to her health.

"Gotcha!" Nicole shrieked as she forgot that Johnny was chasing her. Now caught in the pyro's grip there was no escaping from him. With dexterous fingers, Johnny had her laughing uproariously.

"Nooo! Staaap, stop! Haha!" She tried tugging herself away from him but couldn't get her limbs to move. Sadly, Nicole ended up clutching Johnny's shirt in a desperate attempt to not fall on the ground laughing. Feeling like she had enough punishment, Johnny gave mercy to her and held the laughing woman as she was too weak from laughter.

Smiling wide, Johnny couldn't help but admire how well Nicole fit in his arms. He took no heed of the people walking around them or the various onlookers who pointed rudely at them. Surprisingly, only a few of them recognize them from the news. All that mattered was that he was happy and it was because of her.

"Come on giggles-a-lot, let's go home." With an arm back around her waist, Johnny lead them back to his car as Nicole wrapped her arm around his. When he looked down at her, she merely smiled back at him with cheeks extra rosy from her laughter. He paused a bit before showing her a dorky face. This sent her into another fit of giggles at the silly expression on his face.

Thankfully, without incident, both of them returned to the Baxter Building without anyone noticing them missing.

And like a perfect gentleman, he walked her back to her room. Once outside her door, Johnny leaned against the wall to watch her unlock the door. Curiously, he tilted his head at her.

"Why do you always lock it? No one is gonna steal anything from you."

Nicole blinked her blue eyes before shrugging at him. "Habit, I guess. I lock my things to keep them from being stolen. The military only enforced it."

"Ah." Johnny as he nodded in understanding. Opening her door, Nicole walked into the threshold before turning back to him. She gave him another look before grabbing his shirt and pulling him down for a deeper kiss. "I hope that satisfies you?" His goofy grin on his face told her his answer.

Looking at her clock in her room she noticed the time. "You know, it's not that late… Do you want to come in and hang out?"

"I thought you'll never ask." The goofy grin turned into a smirk as immediately his eyes ventured down.

"Oi, eyes up here buddy," Nicole said half-heartedly. Sometimes she wonders why she even bothered. She was so used to his perversion, she knew it was pointless to say anything.

With an achingly slowness, his eyes traveled back up to her eyes as the burning flare came back to his eyes. "I don't know what you're talking about." He pushes her back into the room and locked the door behind him. "I'm only looking. We agreed, no sex. Nothing what so ever. None of my cock." As he said the word cock, he pushed her flat onto the bed. "Touches your pussy. Nope, I'm okay with this." Evidently, he was not as he got in between her legs and settled himself neatly so his covered erection touched her intimately. "We're just going to watch a movie right?" He caged her with his forearms on either side of her head.

Nicole gave him a disbelieving look, not at all concerned at the position he put them in. "Great. I'm glad we got this out of the way." She said sarcastically. Her eyes glowed blue again as she used the energy she absorbed from Johnny earlier that day. She manifested her shadowy tendrils until they held up Johnny in the air above her.

"Whoa!" Johnny squirmed a bit as he was suspended in the air.

Whistling, Nicole got up and turned her TV onto a random channel. She saw a movie she liked and dropped the remote next to her nightstand. Walking into her closet and shutting the door, Nicole left him suspended in the air. "Hey! You can't just leave me like this."

In the walk-in closet, Nicole ignored him as she changed into more comfortable clothes. A pair of soft gym shorts and a blue tank top with a giant star on it.

"Don't be so annoying then." She walked out of the closet in her new attire to stare at Johnny who was still trying to get out of his bonds. Out of boredom, she started spinning him around with her powers.

"Oh, this is not good," Johnny said as he was spun in circles. "Aw, come on! I'm sorry!" Nicole immediately stopped her spinning.

"Shhh, don't be soo loud dummy. I think everyone is asleep." She told him as she let him flop on the bed. He groaned at the unexpected stop. "It just a little payback for those tickle attacks." Nicole teased him as she viciously rubbed his head with a shadow and then laid on her stomach next to him to watch TV.

Whatever he was going to say was muffled by her bedding. She laughed a bit as she can see that he was still a little dizzy. Grabbing her pillow, Nicole laid it under her chin as she watched Robin Williams character roll a pair a dice as his companions watched him.

As she watched the screen, Nicole felt Johnny move his arm around her waist again. "You're fucking mean." He hissed into her ear. She shivered slightly and smiled at the whispered comment in her ear. Johnny grumbled some more at her before calming down and pulling his arm back. Nicole frowned at the loss of heat from him before staring as he took off the hat, shirt, and his pants, leaving him only in boxers and a muscle shirt.

He raised an eyebrow at her, "What, I can't get comfortable too?" Nicole didn't say anything, instead, she turned her attention back to the TV and not at the hunk who laid himself next to her. "Gimmie some of that." Nicole scowled at him as he yanks half of her pillow so that they could share.

Eventually, they settled into a comfortable silence as they watched Jumanji. Wrapping an arm back around her, Johnny pulled Nicole closer to him as the movie went on. At first, she was a little resistant, but she snuggled closer as he brought up the heat. "Fucking cheater." She murmured to him. He smirked at her sleepy reply.

"You getting sleepy? I know how to wake you up." He whispered as his hand slipped under her shorts.

She gave him a sleepy glare, "Go to sleep you fucking perv." With a snap of her powers, she turned off the TV and the lights while simultaneously tugging the blankets over them. Sighing, Johnny gave up his attempts to convince her to more enjoyable activities.

"Fine." He said in a dejected voice. He really wanted her to play along. Rolling her eyes, Nicole turned over on her side facing away from him. Johnny slowly grinned at her turned back. Even though he was giving up on sex for the night, he'll still take what he can get.

Tugging her body until her ass rested on his crotch, Johnny wrapped his arms around her as he spooned her. "This okay?" He rested his right hand on her stomach under her shirt. Nicole squirmed at the close contact.

"No funny stuff, Storm," Johnny growled as he rubbed his pelvis into her ass.

"Got it, babe." Raising the heat in his hand, Johnny started rubbing her stomach and occasionally venturing further up and touching the underside of her bare breast. "Hmm, no bra? Nice." He bit into the back junction between her neck and shoulder. Nicole gasp and gave a violent shudder at the pleasurable feeling that erupted from her.

"Johnny." She half moaned and half said annoyed with him. He stopped biting her.

"Fine, fine. I'm going to sleep. With a hard on…." He moved his other hand down over her shorts and rubbed her, "And you a wet pussy. Just say the word and I'll do it." He whispered into her ear. Her breathing hitched as his fingers moved up and down before slipping into her shorts.

"You still sure you want to wait on sex?" He said as he dipped his fingers into her. They moved in and out slowly before slowly circulating her clit. He repeated this pattern a few times before pulling his hand out and showing her his glistening fingers in the low light the moon outside provided.

Nicole breathed harshly as the hand still on her stomach heated up and Johnny tasted his fingers. "You taste very sweet, babe."

Even though she was very turned on, Nicole was firmed in her belief to not let him win at anything. Mind made up, Nicole got up and used her powers. So instead of a dominate Johnny taunting her, there on the bed now lay a very tied up Johnny that was helpless against her might.

With a sensual look on her face, Nicole straddles Johnny's waist making sure that she connected with his very erect cock. Surprised, but very happy Johnny laid back and waited. All his hard work was coming to fruition. With deliberate slowness, Nicole grinds against him letting his cock rub her pussy through their layers.

"Is this what you want Johnny?" With nimble fingers, Nicole tugged his boxers down so that he was bare before her.

Johnny groaned, "Oh, fuck yeah." The sudden cool air on his dick felt so refreshing and caused him to shiver.

Smiling, Nicole moved herself down until she was eye level with his penis. With a small kiss on the head, Nicole opened her mouth and took him into her while pumping his dick with her hand. Letting out another groan, Johnny tugged at his bonds wishing that he could tangle his hands in her hair.

Unable to swallow him completely, Nicole's small hands continued to help her pump him as she bobbed her head up and down. So enraptured with the woman before him, Johnny felt the familiar pressure building up inside him.

"F-fuck. I'm so close." Unconsciously, he thrust his hips up into her mouth and caused Nicole to choked a bit before adjusting to him. Just hearing her gag almost caused Johnny to blow his load down her throat.

"Babe, come on, you gotta let me in you," Johnny said desperately. His eyes were blazing white as he hands tried to burn through her bonds. Unfortunately for him, he only strengthens them. Nicole, hearing his plea ignored his pleas. She wanted to let him sweat a bit for all the trouble he caused her. For the next few torturous minutes, she kept up the hard pace she set before slowing down her sucking. Eventually, Nicole stops entirely and was only licking his head before crawling away from him.

Jaw slacked and hips thrusting, Johnny was numb to everything else until he realized that she wasn't touching him anymore, "No, no, no! Why're you-" Johnny stopped as he noticed Nicole started stripping her clothes off. He felt his mouth go dry as the Asian straddled him again naked. Licking his lips, he stared hungrily at the vision before him. She gave him a sexy smile before lining him up against her slit and slowly lowered herself down.

Johnny moaned at the tight feeling on his dick before she started bouncing in his lap. Both of them were breathing hard as they felt their pleasure climb up enough to consume the world around them.

"Fuck! Babe let me go. I gotta get inside you." He pleaded her frantically. He wanted to cum so badly, but he needed to hold her close before filling her. Hearing his plea, Nicole retracted her bonds from him and Johnny wasted no time in getting her on her back before forcing himself back into her tight cavern.

"Ah!" Nicole squeaked as Johnny pulled out and shoved himself back in hard and fast as he fucked her into submission. The need to finish was too much for him as her muscles tightly clamp on his dick. Groaning in pleasure, Johnny did one final thrust before…..

He woke up in bed alone.

At first, Johnny glanced around him in confusion, wondering what happened before he glanced down at the wet spot on his boxers.

"Damn it!"

Not since he was younger had Johnny blown his load in his sleep. As much as he wanted his dream to be true, it wasn't. He went to bed after leaving Nicole's room when she fell asleep in his arms. He cursed himself. The dream felt so real that Johnny groaned as he thought about what his mind dreamed up about her.

Despairing at the loss of opportunity, Johnny covered his face with a pillow and he wished he had stayed with Nicole in her room. Maybe then that dream could have come true.

 **P.S. Thank you all so much for being patient with me. I want to thank everyone who put me on their favorite and alert list. It makes me very happy that my writing has improved so much that I felt confident enough to publish some of my ideas. I hope to write more chapters after this one is finished. By the way, does anyone want this to be a crossover with Avengers? I did put hints of the Fantastic Five being in the MCU timeline.**

 **Shout outs to these lovely people for following and favorite-ing my story. Thank you all so much for liking my story.**

 **Akatsukilover34, alleycat023, Alliepope, AngelRoze, animatedgemini, animebird16, Arianna Le Fay, Ashley Booth, back2vintage, calmingautumn, CarleighAlpha, Evenlight, Gabbi2232, Infernoinside, JanaDowneyEvans, JoySalvatore1, keykeybaby6, kitkatperson8892, Layla347, Lorelei evans, Luiz4200, Mae Ride, MayumiLaufeyson, MEGUMIthePENGUIN, page88, Ronnie.H, ShadowQueenKat, .Twitch, Sr1824, starsnthemoon, teensuprnatural7, tibreezy, TimeLadytennant, Triggerfinger213, Viltho, WarriorHime53, Wonderbat126, X Blue Eyed Demon X, xXallegedangelXx, and XxrudexbutxnicexX**


	11. Scotty! With Omake

**Disclaimer: This is FanFiction! I own no rights to anything of Marvel or Fox.**

 **This is self-beta'd**

 **New 2/11/2018: Edited on Grammarly**

 **A/N: Okay it's been more than a year since I last updated. I just want to say I'm sorry, but real life happened. It was a hard year and some life-changing events happened. I now have two nephews instead of one! Enough of that though. As you read the rest of this chapter you'll realize that I'm gone completely off the canon wagon for this fic. What I'm trying to do is hopefully tie it in with the MCU, but everything will be a mix of MCU Canon, Comic, and whatever AU plot I got in my head. And no, I'm not going to have the plot for the first or second movie in this fic. Those plots were a little flat, but most scenes will be incorporated in this story. I'm going to try my best to give it my all for this story, and I'll try to be consistent with my updates. Please don't expect miracles though on how often I will update.**

 **If you get multiple update emails about this story sorry, I went back and edited the rest of my chapters with Grammarly and hopefully I got all of the errors I missed.**

 **I wanted to thank everyone who followed, favorited, and reviewed my story! It makes me happy I got over 54 favorites, 15 reviews, and 66 followers! :)**

 _Italics_ **\- thoughts**

 **Chapter 10**

 _ **5:30 a.m.**_ _Beep-beep, Beep-beep_

Nicole groaned as she blindly reached for the small CASIO watch on her nightstand. Six years already and her BMT watch was still ticking. Finding her prize, she pushed a button and silenced the alarm before dropping it back on the stand.

 _So tired!_ She internally whined. Rubbing her eyes, Nicole shuffled herself out of bed and got dressed in a thin long-sleeved shirt and yoga pants. Stepping into her master bathroom, Nicole washed her faced before getting ready for the day. With a big yawn, she made her way to her art desk and grabbed the container of glitter. _The herpes of the art world_. Nicole grinned somewhat lazily as she stared at her revenge.

Sneaking out of her room Nicole made her way to Johnny's door passing by Ben who was on the couch sleeping. It was the only thing that could fit him until they could arrange a heavy-duty bed for him.

Standing outside his door, she tested it to see if it was locked. It wasn't. She inwardly scoffed at how cocky he was. Slowly, she opened the door and peered inside. There, Johnny lay on his side cuddling a pillow to him. She stared at him amusedly. _Ka-Ching! Instant blackmail._ Holding up her phone, she gleefully took a picture of him. _So glad I learn how to Photoshop._ _Hehe, later~_

She needed to find his keys. Eyeing the room, Nicole spotted them on the desk beside the bed. Concentrating, she reached out with her powers and encased the keys in a shadow ball to snatch them from the desk without a sound.

Triumphantly, she smirked at him before closing the door softly after her. Step 1 completed.

Keys in hand, Nicole forgot about what she was going to do next.

 _Ah ha!_

Blinking, Nicole stared at the misty shadow that appeared in an image of a light bulb above her head. Not only did her powers manifested into an image corresponding to her ditzy thoughts, but it had also even made an animation of flashing blue specks popping out from it.

 _Well, that's new_.

Deciding it was better not to contemplate the merits of being a real-life shoujo heroine, she waves a hand through the apparition to make it disappear. Her prank was a top priority, not to mention it was going to be hilarious. Though not as funny as what she originally had in mind. Walking to the elevator, Nicole wondered what else she could do with her abilities. She pondered for a moment before another idea came to mind while she absentmindedly dismisses the lightbulb again.

If she could manage this, it would make traveling so much easier. She could totally be a Heartless! Or rather she could be like a Nobody traveling through darkness.

* * *

Almost whistling, Nicole made it back to the top floor as she celebrated her mission success. Now all she had to do was wait. Just because she was now in a tentative relationship with Johnny, didn't mean she couldn't have a little fun with him as payback.

Walking past Ben, the Lao woman made her way to her room before she stopped suddenly. With an evil cackle, she walked back to Ben to plant some evidence.

One trip back to the elevator to spread more chaos, Nicole left both the set of keys on a nearby table and sprinkled some glitter on Ben's pants and was pretty generous with leaving glitter on the colossal hand and left the tub half hidden behind the couch.

Satisfied with her work, Nicole left the room. Unlocking her door, she made her way into her room only to notice her computer making a noise. Curious, she looked at the small computer she mainly used for video chat and recording. Nicole squealed when she noticed an incoming call from her good friend Scott. Yay, a friend was calling her!

"Yo Scotty! A.K.A. Monsieur Mystique, how are you? What sort of secret squirrel stuff are you doing right now that I can perhaps tease away from you?" She heard a deep chuckle as 'Scotty' laugh at her shitty attempt at Intel gathering.

"How are you, Nicole? I see that you are well or as expected from your recent adventure through space." Her friend completely ignored her jab at his 'identity' letting him know for the umpteenth time that she knew Scott wasn't his name. A man of dark skin tone in a very nice green long-sleeve shirt appeared looking around the same age as Nicole filled her computer screen. The background around him was clean and had a modern but foreign look to it. No other details were shown. It seems that he called her from his workplace.

She pouted at him. "Rude." She huffed at him. "I'm good, I'm good. Look! My eyes mutated!" She excitedly pulled down her eyelid to move closer to the camera. "I don't know if I'll change anymore, and I got these awesome shadow powers. Johnny and I have been bouncing names off of each other." Here she rolled her eyes.

"He's dead set on being the Human Torch for some reason. Me? I'm not sure. We were making fun of the names we got for everyone else. I'm been playing around with the name Umbrae. **(Pronounce Um-bree)** You know sort of like umbra for dark? Not too dork-ish? It's a lot better than Johnny's suggestion. Pfftt, Lady of Night. I am not a prostitute." Nicole heard another laugh as Scott's voice filtered from her speakers.

"That sounds like a splendid name, but it all depends on you. Were there any complications on you and your companion's health since you arrived back on Earth? I can send someone to check on your status." Scott's dark skin tightened in worry as he asked her. Nicole blinked at him and noticed that he was growing a beard.

"Nah, we're good." She waved him off. "Susan's a geneticist, and we got Reed here as well. I feel like I forget something though." She folded her arms and looked up at the ceiling. Her friend's lip curled up in a smile as he watched her.

It was a blessing for him to reach her. Normally they would only be able to message each other since their last meeting face to face. They had met each other while at an exchange program during college. They met and became acquainted with one another during the student orientation, and eventually became good friends. He respected her quirky personality, and she had mostly like to tease his need to have a secret identity, but at the same time respected his choice of withholding his information.

The only clue she had was that he came from a long and distinguished history, and was training to take over his father in the business. That's all. As much as she wanted, she refrained from doing any digging into his past.

 _Bing!_ "Ah! I remember!" A single black brow rose up from its natural position as the owner of said brow watched a mockery of a lightbulb swirl into view.

Nicole almost started to twitch as she saw the quirk of a smile on her friend's face. She stayed silent as she once again was treated to her powers acting up without her say so. "Stop that!" She scolded the lightbulb before flapping her hands through the image to make it go away.

"Anyway, do you think you help me with uhhh a prank?" She asked, completely ignoring his amusement at her expense.

"Oh? You need my expertise? Usually, you do not like asking for my help." His accented English distinctively displayed an excellent use of sarcasm, which was so not appreciated by the Asian and subsequently ignored.

She pouted at him. "Pleaseeeeee, oh great and awesome Scotty~ Lend me your strength and expertise! I need thy help and whatever minions you have at thy disposal!" Nicole clapped her hands together in front of her chin in a Nop position and bowed her upper body to her friend before righting herself up. She gave him the most heartbreaking pouty lip for good measure.

"…Okay." She was able to hear the slightly defeated tone in his voice. He never could resist her pout. It just goes amazing with her red cheeks. ….Oh God, she better not let Johnny know she ever had this thought.

"Yay!" She lifted her hands up in the air in victory. "So the thing I need from you is a way to transfer a virus to all things Von Douche-Bag."

Scott's eyebrows raised up at the name. Usually, only people on her good side and the extreme opposite side gets nicknames. From the name she gave the foreign leader, this is obviously one of the extremely bad ones. "…Should I ask what it was that led to Doom acquiring you as an enemy?" His tone of voice changed as he got to business.

"Let's just say he's got too many fingers in too many pies. I mean, sure I love my powers, but that doesn't mean I appreciate that stupid dictator calling the shots. With the whole space station fiasco, I'm sure he's going to make Reed and Ben's life a lot more difficult." Nicole leaned back into her seat as she thought. "He already convinced NASA not to work with us on the whole fixing Ben's orange problem. Not to mention all the emails I've been sending out to other experts for their opinions has been denied and I was told not to ever contact them again on the issue." Nicole scowled at that.

"It's only a matter of time before he starts something we can't finish. He's been a lot twitchier lately, and it's giving me the heebie-jeebies whenever he's in the Baxter Building. Luckily, all the work stuff I do is on Reed's computer. Everything else is on this one or my other laptop. By the way, I'm really glad you gave me this laptop." She shivered as she thought of something unpleasant.

"Between the looks, he gives at the 'thing' Reed and Susan have and the creepy ones he's been giving me; I rather have him busy with his company and far, _far_ away from me. The best I can think of is to mess with his company systems. And guess who has access to his systems?"

The dark frown Scott developed lighten only slightly as he asked who. "Susan does~ and guess who knows her password? Hehehe I do. That idiot was even stupid enough to give Susan complete access to his systems." Nicole gave an evil cackle as she rubbed her hands together. Scott shot her another amused look as he too gives in to the urge to laugh. "I made a dummy account on his systems for us to play with so it can't be traced back to Susan. I even made it seem like it was him that made the account. Here look, I took a peek at his emails; there's a lot of shady stuff he has. Oooh, I think I even recognize a couple of black arms dealers on here."

"What?" Scott's flat voice called out to her over the click-clacking of the keyboard.

"Hm? Oh, I manage to get into his personal computer. You know, I'm really glad I had that TS clearance for my job and all that free time to look up stupid people on the government shit-list. Otherwise, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have even recognized some of these names without it…. Wow~, look at this name, U-Ulysses Klee-kla-Klaue?" She blew a raspberry in the air frustrated when the words didn't come out right. "Ulysses Klaue," Nicole spoke the words slowly as she got her muscles to work properly with her brain.

"Ugh moving on, well would you look at that." She sent a screen-shot to him. "Looks like Doom's going out of the country in two weeks. Apparently, he's meeting this guy to get supplies from him. Some metals, other stuff I don't care about, and Vibranium….. Whaaaa?! Like the stuff Captain America's shield is made out of?" While she gave the page another in-depth view, she missed the expression on her friend's face.

What Nicole didn't notice as she rechecked the screen was 'Scott's' facial expression. A look of shock, horror, and indignation appeared on his face before changing into a look of mild curiosity when Nicole glanced back at his video before looking away again.

Sounds of a mouse clicking and keys clacking were heard before she spoke up again, "Looks like a correspondence was dated to a couple of days before we launched into space." She whistled lowly, "That's a lot of money. What the hell is Doom going to do with all that Vibranium?"

"Nicole." Scott's stern voice knocked the Asian from her thinking. Looking up, Nicole saw the determined look on his face as he set down his phone.

"Thank you for the information. I'll be sure to get everything started with your little 'prank' on Doom." Nicole completely missed the emphasis Scott put on the word prank or the disdain at Doom's name. "But I'm afraid some business has come up with my father's company, and everything will need to be on hold. We'll be in contact again once we dealt with the saboteurs we have recently been made aware of."

Some angry voices appeared off-screen, and Scott turned to look at the people talking to him. Nicole didn't recognize the language, but she can understand that they were pretty angry about something.

"Well, I hope you catch whoever-"

 **CRASH!**

"You piece of shit rock! What the hell did Baby do to you?!"

"JOHNNY!" It almost felt like the whole building was going to shake from the fury she could practically feel from her room.

Nicole's slightly guilty and elated face was plain to see as Scott, and his associates peered into the screen at her. She felt her face redden at the curious faces momentary losing their angry looks to gaze at her.

"Is there something I should know about?" An elegant eyebrow rose in sync with the question directed at her. Nicole was slightly envious of his ability to raise said single eyebrow.

She shrugged and lost some of the redness in her cheeks. "Just some payback and a little deflection of blame." She stage-whispered the next part in a mischievous voice, "Some people need a little bit of sunshine in their life, and I think glitter is a pretty good substitute for it."

 **CRACK!**

She turned her chair slowly in the direction of her door. "Hmm, do I really care to see what they broke?"

"I am sure that Mr. Richards will need your help before something else is beyond repair." Nicole slumped her shoulders at him.

"Ugh, fine. Bye bye, Scott's dad whose name I still don't know and other people I don't know. Do you need the account stuff before I leave?"

"It would be appreciated." Some fast typing went by before the information was sent out.

"'Kay, bye. Happy hunting!" Nicole smiled and waved at the camera before moving her mouse to the end call button.

It was only a second, but Nicole thought she saw some fiercely-savage grins appeared on all faces before the video cut off. "Hmm, note to self. Don't be that guy."

Standing up, she closed her laptop before making her way to the door. Nicole wonders if she should do anything else to help escalate the chaos she sowed.

" **What are you idiots think you're doing?!"** a shriek was heard and a dead silence echoed through the building.

"On second thought maybe not." Bravely, Nicole walked out of her room to face the creature known as an Angry Susan.

* * *

 **Omake**

Some shuffling sounded off-screen as a camera was turned on, recording a short young woman crouching down to look around a corner as she held the camera. "Sabaidee. 'Ello people, Nicole here and its day something-or-other since arrival back on Earth." Shouting and bangs sounded from around the corner, and the camera shifted to viewing four figures in a large open living room.

"For today's episode, we have a special treat here. We're going to be observing the great Susie Invisibilitis as she herds her pack the Fantasicles (Fan-tas-i-kles, sounds like Socrates.) Observe as how she dominates Sapien Torchis, Ghenis Thingy, and the Stretch Fantasicles himself. It should be rather interesting. Let's watch.

The camera turns back to the Fantasicles as the creature known as the 'Susie Invisibilitis' proceeded to scold the males. "As you can see the Susie Invisibilitis is normally a calm animal. She makes her home here in the Baxter building and is currently the only known specimen of the Fantasicles here that has the power of invisibility as shown in her name. Unfortunately, in order for us to see her amazing ability, we have to provoke her."

The video moved again to show Nicole winking at it. "We won't be doing the provoking though. We're fortunate enough to have the other Fantasicles do that for us. Look!" The whispered exclamation was followed by the camera moving back into position.

"Look, look over there at the Sapien Torchis. We have the not so rare ability of the Sapien Torchis and his great ability to burn his fur! He sheds his fur frequently, but has the amazing ability to regrow new ones by a special ritual dance in the Walmaritus and miraculously he has grown a new coat of fur." The viewers saw the video zoom into a closer view of the Torchis absentmindedly burning new holes in the clothes he had just bought.

"Oh? Look the Ghenis Thingy is communicating with the Stretch Fantasicles. It seems like they're about to make a run for it. What they don't know is that another special ability of the Susie Invisibilitis is that she can actually seal the room from escape using her barrier power!" Nicole whispered excited to the camera, "But let's talk more about the relationship those two older males have for each other. Now, these two go way back into their college cycle days as young bucks. First Ghenis Thingy. What you have to know about the Ghenis Thingy is that he's territorial with a few protective tendencies in the mix. He guards the herd as he feels he must guide and nurture his best bud Stretch Fantasicles." The camera shifted as Nicole slipped into the room to another hidden corner of the room. The yelling has yet to stop as the Sapien Torchis tried to posture himself against the might of the Susie Invisibilitis. The other two wiser Fantasicles members on the other hand hunch back as to not bring attention to themselves.

"Stretch Fantasicles, on the other hand, is a bit scatter-brained. Usually, he's a very smart man, but he has his moments where he becomes distracted. Especially during mating season. We might be seeing more of that later in another video about the mating dance of the Fantasicles. As the only other alpha male of the group, Stretch Fantasicles has the ability to stretch himself to great lengths and flexibilities. He uses this ability in surprisingly ingenious ways. For privacy reasons, I won't go into detail on the hygiene routines that Stretch Fantasicles has established for himself. While his powers are all well and good, it doesn't necessarily save him when he needs it. That's where Ghenis Thingy comes in with his beta instincts to protect his alpha with his incredible rocky strength."

The angle of the camera zoomed in on Reed and Ben's Face as they seemed to talk without words, but went stiff as a statue when Susan turned her sights on them. "Unfortunately for them, they won't stand a chance against the true power of the Fantasicles." The camera zoomed out to view the room's occupants again.

Johnny sat on the couch with a scowl and arms folded. He leaned back in his seat as he muttered lowly to himself. Susan was now about to converge onto Reed and Ben until suddenly she caught sight of the camera with a frown.

"Oh crikey! She spotted us!"

"Nicole, what are you doing?" The famous Susan frown became more pronounced as she walked over to Nicole.

"The Susie Invisibilitis just became more agitated! We got to run!"

"Wha- Wait! Nicole, you get back here this instant and tell me what you have on that camera!"

The Asian scattered as she ran away from the blond. "Oh, she's angry! Run! The alpha female has an amazing ability to scold you into oblivion. Stay tuned next time to the Fantasticles Article! Bye!"

The air shimmered in front of the camera before Nicole ran into a barrier and came crashing down with the camera. "Oi! That hurt." Nicole's exaggerated Lao version of Steve Irwin's accent slipped back into her normal West Coast accent. Picking up the camera, she aimed it back at herself before regaining the horrible Lao/Australian impersonation she was doing. "She did it! Did you see that? Susie Invisibilitis just used her powers on us to prevent me from escaping."

"Pftt, Nicole what are you doing?" Johnny got over his moping session as he tried to fight down the urge to laugh hysterically at the Asian.

"Nothin'." Nicole turned the camera back to herself but allowed the viewers to catch another glimpse of Susan pausing in her march over to Nicole to process this new, headache-inducing, unexpected twist of the day.

"Don't worry! What the Susie Invisibilitis and other Fantasicles don't know is that the final member Umbraeness Nobitius (Um-bree-ness No-bi-ti-us) has, you guess it… shadow powers! And I can counteract this great barrier!" Nicole was suddenly enveloped in darkness as her eyes glowed her luminescent blue.

In a flash, Nicole sank down into her shadow before the swirly black and blue blot on the floor dash across the remaining distance and zoomed right under the barrier coming out of the other side. Rising back up from the floor Nicole popped back up with the camera completely missing the last 10 seconds. "Ha! It worked!"

"?!" Everyone was speechless.

"Bye-bye! Lā k̀on!" The camera stopped recording as it was turned off.

Fin~


End file.
